This is a very special piece of American Military and Horological history. 

Here we have an Elgin B.W. Raymond pocketwatch made for the U. S. Army. The basic16-size movement is the standard 21j jewels, adjusted railroad grade watch movement, but this one is marked “U.S. Army. What makes it even more interesting and what makes this watch very special is after it was delivered to the military, it was sent back to the factory and was modified for another purpose. 

I believe it started its military life used for navigation much like the Hamilton 4992B. It had a center sweep seconds hand. The 3rd wheel has an extended pinion to drive the sweep seconds hand and there are 3 holes in the bridge that would have held the seconds’ bridge. These are perfectly filled like only a factory could do. The center wheel jewel was changed from the original gold bezel set to one with a brass setting. I am thinking because the diameters were different on the different center wheels.  The dial was also replaced with a Montgomery-style dial with sub-seconds. The Keystone case is correct U. S. military and has all the U.S. military contract marking on the case back. Inside case back is stamped “cased and timed by Elgin”. 

I have been collecting and as a watchmaker, handling American military watches for nearly 40 years and have never seen this before. I’ve done some research online and found a picture of another, but not much information. 

*Photos are of the watch in its current, unrestored state.

The price includes full restoration and repair. The work will be performed after purchase. This entails proper service of the movement, a new mainspring, and anything else that would be necessary to bring the watch into proper working order. Case cleaning and refinishing are also included. The extent of case refinishing, if any will be left up to the new owner.

Once you’ve made your purchase, please contact us so we may discuss the restoration and case refinishing.

Please allow 1-2 weeks after purchase for service to be completed.

Our goal is to achieve what we refer to as “Sympathetic Restoration”; in other words, bringing the watch back as close as possible to its original appearance without the need to remove all signs of its former life. We don’t want to dramatically change its history.