British Hallmark Examples

Copyright © David Boettcher 2005 - 2023 all rights reserved.

This page includes a number of examples of British hallmarks that should show you want to look out for when your are trying to read British hallmarks. I hope you have read my page about British hallmarks so you know that you should be looking for all four parts of a hallmark. I have also included a bit of history for some of the companies mentioned that I hope you find interesting.

These British hallmarks were struck on items of gold or silver manufactured in the UK. From 1842 imported gold and silver items should also have been assayed and hallmarked in a British assay office, but very few were. From 1867 imported gold and silver items should have been stamped with an "F" mark denoting Foreign origin in addition to the usual British hallmarks, but again very few, if any, were.

From about 1874 increasing numbers of foreign gold and silver watch cases began to be hallmarked in British assay offices, and there are examples of some of these further down this page. British watch and watch case manufacturers objected to this and new hallmarks to be used on foreign watches were introduced in 1887 to be used from 1 January 1888. No watches are known to exist with these marks. The British hallmarking of foreign watches was effectively halted until 1 June 1907 when new rules and a new set of hallmarks for imported watches were ordained, and from that date all foreign gold and silver watches were hallmarked with British import hallmarks.

Caution about Date Letters

Note that each assay offices had its own unique cycles of date letters so you must use the correct one. Date letters span two calendar years because the punches were changed when new wardens were elected, which was usually about half way through the calendar year. This is often not explained and many “experts” don't seem to know. See also my note about the shields around date letters. Those on old may different from those on silver, particularly if they are London Assay Office hallmarks. Most guides only show shield shapes for date letters on silver. Also different shield shapes were often used for small items, and for watch cases. There is only one book that I am aware of, Jackson's Silver and Gold Marks, that shows the London Assay Office shield shapes used on gold as well as those used on silver, but not even this shows all the shields used on watch cases. You are welcome to email me via my contact page if you need help with a hallmark or date letter.

Dome cases

British pocket watches from the nineteenth century are often found in cases which have a fixed inner "dome" that is seen when the back is opened to wind the watch. The way to see the movement with a case like this is not immediately evident, it has to be swung out from the front of the case and the cap removed. For how to do this and more about cases see watch cases.

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William Mean

London Assay Office Hallmarks, 1812 to 1813

The sponsor's mark is WM with a star above, all incuse. Grimwade (London Goldsmiths 1697 - 1837 Their Marks by Arthur G Grimwade) shows that this mark was entered by William Mean, a London watch case maker. Mean entered his first mark, WM with fleur-de-lys above all incuse in 1783. The mark with the star above was first entered on 5 October 1800 when he was at 19 St. John's Lane, London, and a similar punch was registered on 1 December 1818 when he moved to 2 Jerusalem Passage.

The case has London Assay Office (leopard's head) hallmarks for sterling silver (the lion passant). The leopard's head is crowned, which says that the hallmarks are pre-1822. The date letter is the Roman capital "R" of the hallmarking year from 1812 to 1813. Date letter punches were changed when new wardens were elected at the end of May, so the London hallmarking year ran from the beginning of June to May of the following year. So this case was made at 19 St. John's Lane.

Why there are two leopard's heads I don't know. I believe that the "M" is the joint maker's mark. (The hinges of a watch case are called “joints”; Mean would have employed a number of specialists who did different aspects of the work; case maker, joint maker, springer, polisher, boxer-in, etc. The joint maker was the most highly skilled. The pendant would have been bought from a pendant maker and might have his sponsor's mark.)

The movement is a typical verge fusee of the period with a Tompion regulator. The name William Stocker of Honiton in Devon is recorded in Loomes as late eighteenth to early nineteenth century, which ties in nicely. Stocker was a retailer who ordered the watch from a London “finisher”. The barrel bar on which the name is engraved was introduced to make it easy to remove the barrel if it was necessary to change a broken mainspring, and was quickly recognised as an ideal place on which to engrave retailer's names because that could be done at a late stage.

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William Ehrhardt Sponsor's Mark and Hallmarks

Two sets of hallmarks are shown here from cases of watches made by the company of William Ehrhardt Ltd. of Birmingham, England. William Ehrhardt first entered a sponsor's mark at the Birmingham Assay Office on 14 November 1867.

Starting with the images from Ken in USA, reading from the top and then left to right the hallmarks are:

• The lion passant or walking lion with raised right forepaw, the standard mark for sterling silver.
• An anchor: the town mark of the Birmingham Assay Office.
• The date letter in the picture of the full case back is a capital "k" in a rectangular shield with curly base: the date letter of the Birmingham hallmarking year 1909 to 1910.
• In the picture of the full case back the sponsor's mark is "W.E" in an oval shield, the registered mark of William Ehrhardt Ltd. This sponsor's mark was first entered at the Birmingham Assay Office on 20 February 1907.

The cropped picture from Darren W. in Auckland shows the earliest sponsor's mark entered by Ehrhardt at the Birmingham Assay Office in November 1867, the initials "W.E" incuse without surround. Several other forms of marks were entered by the Ehrhardt company over the years.

The hallmarks in Darren's image are an anchor, the Birmingham Assay Office town mark, a lion passant, the standard mark of sterling silver, and the date letter "o" in Black Letter Small face for 1888 to 1889.

Note that the Birmingham Assay Office used unique shield shapes for date letters specifically on watch cases in the nineteenth century that are not shown in any published tables.

William Ehrhardt

William Ehrhardt (1831-1897) was born in Germany and served an apprenticeship as a watchmaker there. He came to England in 1851, the year of the Great Exhibition. He worked for a time with Upjohn & Bright watchmakers in London before settling in Birmingham.

In 1856 Ehrhardt set up a company at 30 Paradise Street, Birmingham. It seems his intention was to make watches by machinery. This was before John Wycherley set up his factory in 1866 in Prescot, Lancashire, and before Aaron Dennison formed the Anglo-American Watch Company in 1871 in Birmingham, so Ehrhardt was one of the pioneers of watchmaking by machinery in England.

Ehrhardt was not in England at the time of Ingold's doomed venture in the 1840s, but perhaps he was influenced by the reason for its failure, which was principally due to opposition from established English watchmakers. Ehrhardt chose Birmingham because it was away from the traditional centres of English watch manufacturing where watches were made by hand using craft skills and factory methods would be opposed, as Ingold had been. Ehrhardt wanted machine operators for his factory, not traditional watchmakers.

From 1856 to 1863 Ehrhardt's company operated from addresses in Paradise Street and Augusta Street in Birmingham. In 1864 the factory was moved to Great Hampton Street, and an advert with this address in 1872 says that the company had ... constructed machinery to make his patent keyless movement on the interchangeable system.

William Ehrhardt entered a sponsor's mark at the Birmingham Assay Office on 14 November 1867. This meant that he could send in watch cases to be assayed and hallmarked. It was usual for watch cases to be made by specialist watch case makers, of which there were many in the watchmaking areas of London, Coventry and Liverpool. However, Birmingham did not have such a conglomeration of independent specialists supporting watch movement finishers, which suggests that Ehrhardt's company made watch cases as well as movements, and probably dials and hands as well, so that unlike most English watch manufacturers, all the parts of a watch could be made and finished in the Ehrhardt factory.

In 1873 Ehrhardt was naturalised as a British citizen. In 1874 he built a new factory called “Time Works” in Barr Street to increase production. It is thought that by this time Ehrhardt's company had produced 200,000 watches.

Ehrhardt was granted a patent, No. 6406 dated 1894, for improvements in the hand setting mechanism of keyless watches. The invention was a mechanism that allowed the keyless mechanism to be put into hand set mode by pulling the crown outwards away from the case. This is the way that watches are set today so it seems very familiar, but there were hundreds if not thousands of different mechanisms patented in the nineteenth century to effect this before the sliding pinion design invented by Adrien Philippe in 1845 was eventually adopted pretty well universally.

When William Ehrhardt died in 1897 his sons William and Gustav Victor carried on the business. In the obituary notice it was said that 500 watches were made per week with 400 personnel. In 1898 the business was incorporated as William Ehrhardt Limited with 250 employees.

Production peaked around 1900 when 250 persons were employed, including many girls who attended the machines, and 600 to 700 watches were made per week. The lower number of employees but greater number of watches made per week imply that Ehrhardt's sons had increased the productivity of the workforce by increased use of specialised machinery.

From around 1920 the company used the name “British Watch Company Ltd.” on some of its watches, most likely hoping to gain patriotic support in the face of growing imports, a sign of the pressure on the few remaining English watch manufacturers.

The company William Ehrhardt Ltd. was liquidated in 1923, by which date it was one of the very last English watch manufacturers. From 1923 until 1927 the Barr Street address was being used in adverts promoting a new company “G. V. Ehrhardt & Hereward Ltd.” as watch cleaners and repairers, but with no mention of watch manufacture.

Sponsor's Marks and Trademarks

The company used the two trademarks shown in the image above. The winged arrow trademark was registered on on 4 February 1878 and sometimes varies from the shape shown here with simpler and less detailed wings. The fir tree trademark was registered on 4 August 1911 and was used on watches that carry the British Watch Company name.

The sponsor's mark “W.E” incuse was entered at the Birmingham Assay Office on 14 November 1867 by William Ehrhardt, and also at the London Assay Office.

After the first incuse punch, further punches with “WE” and “W.E” in cameo within oval and rectangular shields were registered between 1880 and 1914.

The punch mark shown here with “W.E” in cameo within an oval surround was made by one of three punches registered between 1907 and 1914.

Production

The watches manufactured appear to have been initially full plate key wound with going barrels, with anticlockwise winding to simulate the presence of a fusee. Early models had English right angle lever escapements with pointed escape wheel teeth and the frames pinned together, later models had Swiss straight line lever escapements with club tooth escape wheels with the frames screwed together. The patent granted to Ehrhardt in 1894 shows that he was interested in keyless winding by that date, and later production included three quarter plate movements with keyless winding.

In an article in Antiquarian Horology Winter 1996 D. H. Bacon estimated the total output of Ehrhardt watches from the 1874 founding of the Time Works factory as 775,000 watches. This works out very approximately as about fifteen and a half thousand watches a year or 300 a week over 50 years. The rate was lower than this in the beginning and towards the end, and higher in the good years between 1885 and 1910.

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Alfred Henry Read, Chester 1888/89 Hallmarks

British made case

These hallmarks are in the British made case of a watch "made" by Alfred Henry Read of Coventry.

Reading from the top and then left to right the hallmarks are:

• The lion passant or walking lion with raised right forepaw, the mark for sterling silver.
• An upright sword between three wheat sheaves: the town mark of the Chester Assay Office.
• The date letter capital "E" in a rectangular shield: the date letter of the Chester hallmarking year 1888 to 1889.
• The sponsor's mark "A.H.R" in a rectangular shield, the registered mark of Alfred Henry Read.

The number 11 below the hallmarks is probably the joint maker's mark. The hinges on watch cases are called "joints" for some unknown reason, and making them was a skilled craft that one man dedicated himself to. There were many specialist trades involved in making a watch case including case maker, joint maker, pendant maker, bow maker, springer, boxer-in, engine turner and polisher.

If you click on the images to the right, you should get a bigger view.

The initials JW on the movement plate are for John Wycherley of Prescot, an English pioneer of mass produced rough movements. In 1866 Wycherley set up a factory in Warrington Road, Prescot, with three floors and steam power to produce plates and other parts by machinery that were interchangeable.

The number 7673 on the watch movement is Wycherley's serial number for the movement. The 12 followed by an 0 over a 3 gives the size or “calliper” of the movement, the size being the diameter of the bottom (dial) plate measured by a pair of callipers. This calliper size is called the Lancashire gauge for determining watch sizes. A diameter of 1" plus 5/30 inches for the mounting flange was taken as the base size and called zero (0) size. Each 1/30 inch increased in diameter increments the size one number. The 12 on this movement indicates that it is 1 and 17/30 inches diameter. The 0 over 3 indicates the pillar height, the distance separating the two plates of the movement. Standard pillar height was taken 1/8" indicated as 0/0, with increments indicated above the line and decrements below in 1/144". For more about this see watch sizes.

Wycherley's methods were an advance of the normal method of manufacturing in England at the time. Prescot was the location of a large industry producing rough movements, mostly in the time honoured craft way, largely by hand with hand powered tools and simple hand operated machines. These rough movements were then sent to London or Coventry to be finished and built into watches. The rough movement consisted of the bulkier and simpler parts of the movement; the plates, spring barrel, fusee and train wheels and pinions.

The Coventry Watch Museum Project records Alfred Henry Read working as a "watch manufacturer" between 1883 and 1901. This watch shows that Read was one of many Coventry watchmakers who “manufactured” watches by buying rough movements from a movement maker such as Wycherley and “finishing” them - fitting the escapement, jewelling, engraving, gilding etc. Usually such a watchmaker would have cases made by a watch case maker who would apply his own sponsor's mark, but it appears that Read's operation was larger than most and also made cases. Read employed apprentices and journeymen to do the finishing, and had his own workshop for making cases, but much of the work may still have been done by “putting out” - sending the part finished watch to various specialists working in their own homes or small workshops to have each stage of the work completed.

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English Watch Co. Birmingham 1878 / 1879 Hallmarks

British made case

These hallmarks are in the British made case of a watch made by the English Watch Co. of Coventry.

Reading from the top and then left to right the marks are:

• The lion passant or walking lion with raised right forepaw, the mark for sterling silver.
• The anchor: the town mark of the Birmingham Assay Office.
• The date letter "d" in Black Letter font: the date letter of the Birmingham hallmarking year 1878 to 1879.
• Below the these upper three hallmarks is the trademark of the English Watch Company.
• Finally the sponsor's mark "R·B" in a rectangular shield, the registered mark of Robert Bragge.

If you click on the images to the right, you should get a bigger view.

Note that the shields in this hallmark around the Birmingham Assay Office town mark and the date letter cameos are not the same shape as shown in the published tables but instead have a point at the base and flat top. This was a shape that the Birmingham Assay Office reserved for watch cases.

According to Priestley there are two candidates for the sponsor's mark "R·B" in a rectangular shield; Richard Baker of Coventry who registered this mark in 1838, and Robert Bragge of the English Watch Co. who registered an apparently identical mark in 1878. This shouldn't happen, but record keeping was not as efficient then as now and it could be that Baker had ceased work in the intervening 40 years between his registration and Bragge's. The trademark of the English Watch Co. clearly shows that this particular mark is Robert Bragge's.

The name on the movement, William Philcox, 83 High Street, Wandsworth, is that of the retailer, not the maker; it was common practice at the time for the retailer to have their name engraved on the movement by the manufacturer.

The square boss in the middle of the barrel bridge, between "High St." and "Wandsworth" is where a key was applied to wind the watch. This square is on the end of the barrel arbor and winds the watch mainspring directly. This was because the machinery on which the plates were made was designed for the American market, where the use of a going barrel which drove the train directly was the norm while English watchmakers were still clinging to the use of the fusee. In an English watch with a fusee the key was applied to the fusee arbor and wound anticlockwise, so later versions of English Watch Co. watches were made with an extra gear to replicate this direction of winding for the comfort of English customers, although the watches remained driven by a going barrel and not a fusee.

There is a history of this company at English Watch Company.

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Alfred Fridlander: London 1883 / 1884 Hallmarks

British made movement and case

These are London hallmarks in an 18 carat gold case. The sponsor's mark was entered at the London Assay Office by Alfred Fridlander, a watchmaker of Coventry. It is likely that the movement was finished in Coventry from a rough movement made in Prescot, and that the case was made in Coventry in Fridlander's factory.

Reading from the top the marks are:

• The sponsor's mark "AF" in a square shield – the registered mark of Alfred Fridlander.
• In the centre: a crown above an 18 – the standard mark of 18 carat gold from 1798.
• To the left the date letter "H" – the date letter of the London hallmarking year 1883 to 1884, see the note below about the date letter shield shape.
• To the right the leopard's head, and no other town mark – indicating the London Assay Office.

If you click on the image you should get a bigger view.

Alfred Fridlander

Alfred Emanuel Fridlander (1840 - 1928) was born in Birmingham and became one of Coventry's most distinguished watchmakers. By 1871 he was living in Coventry and gave his employment as a watchmaker employing 30 men and 6 boys. He is recorded at Holyhead Road Coventry.

The sponsor's mark of the initials AF in a rectangular shield with cut corners was entered at the London Assay Office by Alfred Fridlander. It appears to be one of three similar punches that Fridlander registered between 1872 and 1882. Fridlander's first registration at the London Assay Office was on 13 October 1868 with a similar mark differing only in that there was a pellet between the A and the F, like this: A•F.

Fridlander supplied many London retailers with watches. This included supplying S. Smith and Sons with many watches including their first non-magnetic watches, some of which were exhibited and awarded a gold medal and diploma at the 1892 Crystal Palace Electrical Exhibition. Fridlander also supplied movements for the Royal Geographical Society waterproof watches, often called traveller's or explorer's watches. Many Fridlander watches were tested at the Kew trials and received Class A and Especially Good certificates, often having Kaurrusel revolving escapements and cut bimetallic temperature compensating balances.

Fridlander became a wealthy man having diversified, like many Coventry manufacturers, into the bicycle and motorcycle business, where he became a director of the Triumph Cycle Co, the Auto Machinery Co. and Leigh Mills Co. These companies were set up in Coventry to use the skills the local workforce had gained in watchmaking that became available as watchmaking in the city declined and the workers looked for other employment. Fridlander became a town councillor and Justice of the Peace (J.P.), and he served in that role for 28 years.

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Rotherham & Sons, London 1881 / 1882 Hallmarks

British made case

These hallmarks are in the British made case of a watch made by Rotherham & Sons of Coventry.

Reading from the top and then left to right the marks are:

• The lion passant or walking lion, the mark for sterling silver.
• The sponsor's mark "JR" in a diamond shield, the registered mark of John Rotherham.
• The leopard's head: the town mark of the London Assay Office.
• The date letter "F": the date letter of the London hallmarking year 1881 to 1882.

If you click on the image of the hallmarks to the right, you should get a bigger view with each mark highlighted.

NB: Don't confuse the "F" date letter of this hallmark with the cameo mark "F" (for "Foreign") in an oval shield that from 1867 onwards should have been struck on all imported gold and silver items. The "Foreign" mark would obviously not have been struck in an English made case, but should appear in foreign watches from 1867 until 1887 but has never been seen (unless you have one? If you do, please let me know).

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Alfred Bedford, Waltham, Birmingham 1899 / 1900 Hallmarks

British made case

These hallmarks are in the case of a watch by the American Watch Co. of Waltham, MA, USA. The movement was of course made in America, but the case was made in Britain by Dennison in Birmingham, although their trademarks don't appear on this case.

One can't be so certain about all Waltham watch cases with British hallmarks, because Bedford for Waltham had watch cases made in Britain, Switzerland and America, all of which they had hallmarked in Britain before the 1888 Merchandise Marks Act put a stop to that practice.

In evidence to the Select Committee on hallmarking in 1878 Alfred Bedford, the manager of Waltham UK, said that they could not get enough watch cases made in England and that in 1877 Waltham UK had imported 5,000 watch cases from the USA and 18,000 from Switzerland. Bedford said that these were mostly hallmarked at Chester. To the Select Committee on the Merchandise Marks Amendment Act, which sat in 1887, Bedford said "At our case factory at Birmingham we turn out something like 50,000 cases a year for our watches." This factory is almost certainly what became the Dennison watch case factory.

As I discuss on my page about assay and hallmarking, the 1887 Merchandise Marks Amendment Act made it illegal for foreign watch cases to be marked with British hallmarks like this from 1888 onwards, so this case was British made and given the relationship and history between Waltham and Dennison, this case was certainly made by the Dennison company. It appears that Waltham wanted Bedford's sponsor mark rather than Dennison's to appear on their watches.

Reading from the top and then left to right the marks are:

• The lion passant or walking lion, the mark for sterling silver.
• The anchor: the town mark of the Birmingham Assay Office.
• The date letter "Z": the date letter of the Birmingham hallmarking year 1899 to 1900.
• The sponsor's mark "A·B" in a rectangular shield, the registered mark of Alfred Bedford, director of Waltham UK.

Note that the shields in this hallmark around the Birmingham Assay Office town mark and the date letter cameos are not the same shape as shown in the published tables but instead have a point at the base and cut top corners. This was a shape that the Birmingham Assay Office reserved for watch cases.

Thanks to Richard Edwards for the picture of the hallmarks.

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IWC "Seeland"; Castelberg, Chester 1877 / 1878 Hallmarks

Swiss made case

These English hallmarks are in the Swiss made case of an IWC "Seeland" watch.

Reading from the top and then left to right the marks are:

• The lion passant or walking lion, the mark for sterling silver.
• A sword erect between three wheatsheafs (garbs): the town mark of the Chester Assay Office.
• The date letter "O": the date letter of the Chester hallmarking year 1877 to 1878.
• The sponsor's mark "AC" incuse in an oval incuse shield, the registered mark of Antoine Castelberg.

IWC "Seeland" watches were made during the period from October 1876 to the summer of 1879 when IWC was under the control of Frederic Francis (Frank) Seeland who was appointed to manage the IWC factory in October 1876, after the first company, founded by F.A. Jones, had gone bankrupt. The sponsor's mark is "AC" incised within an oval. This mark was registered at the Chester Assay Office on 17 October 1877 and was the mark of Antoine Castelberg of 58 Holborn Viaduct, London, a watch dealer and importer from La Chaux-de-Fonds. Castelberg had several London addresses, his sponsor's mark was first registered with the London Assay Office on 25 August 1875 with the address 90 Newgate Street London. On 2 August 1876 he moved to 58 Holborn Viaduct. The incised mark registered to Castleberg is unusual because UK makers usually used cameo (relief) marks like the other assay office marks.

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Arthur Baume, Longines, London 1877 / 1878 Hallmarks

Swiss made case

These hallmarks are in the Swiss made case of a Longines watch imported by Baume & Co.

Reading from the top and then left to right the marks are:

• The sponsor's mark "AB" in an oval shield, the registered mark of Arthur Baume of Baume & Co.
• The lion passant or walking lion, the mark for sterling silver.
• The leopard's head: the town mark of the London Assay Office.
• The date letter "B": the date letter of the London hallmarking year 1877 to 1878.

If you click on the image you should get a bigger view.

You can read more about this history of this important watch manufacturer on my page about Longines.

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Charles Nicolet, Stauffer, Son, & Co. London 1886 / 1887 Hallmarks

Swiss made case

These hallmarks are in the Swiss made case of a Swiss watch imported by the Anglo/Swiss company Stauffer & Co.

Reading from the top and then left to right the marks are:

• The lion passant or walking lion, the mark for sterling silver.
• The leopard's head: the town mark of the London Assay Office.
• The date letter "L": the date letter of the London hallmarking year 1886 to 1887.
• The sponsor's mark "CN" in a rectangular shield with cut corners, the registered mark of Charles Nicolet, a director of Stauffer & Co.

If you click on the image you should get a bigger view.

Thanks to Deveron Jewellers for the picture.