An important and very impressive Victorian gilt-brass striking giant carriage clock by Dent of London, signed and numbered on the white enamel dial Dent 61 Strand & 34 Royal Exchange London 1892 and similarly signed and numbered on the backplate Dent 61 Strand & 34 Royal Exchange London. 1892. The dial with a Roman chapter hour ring and outer indications for the minutes with a pair of blued steel hands and a subsidiary seconds ring at XII with Arabic numerals and a blued steel pointer. The movement with five conical double-screwed pillars and twin chain fusees, maintaining power to the going with platform lever escapement having a cut bimetallic balance, strike/repeat on a gong and with strike and silent lever and winding squares on the backplate. The high-quality case, featuring a gilt dial mask engraved with scrolling foliage and a central basket of flowers flanked by flowering cornucopias, the top with a large, bevelled viewing aperture, surmounted by a robust handle partially engraved with foliage on a hatched ground, with glazed sides, the right side with a push repeat button, deeply chamfered angles applied with gilt bronze foliate cast decoration on a stepped base, raised on elaborate foliate cast feet

London, date circa 1855

Height 24 cm.

Literature: Charles Allix, “Carriage Clocks, their History and Development”, 1974, p. 252, listing a similar but slightly earlier Dent carriage clock of circa 1852, signed on the dial: 61 Strand London and numbered 1503, which is illustrated alongside a number of other carriage clocks on p. 300, pl. IX/95 (far right of the top row).   Derek Roberts, “Carriage and other Travelling Clocks”, 1993, p. 306, pl. 21-6, illustrating a Dent carriage clock, numbered 1567, which as here is signed on the dial Dent 61 Strand and 34 Royal Exchange London and features a very similar main dial with insert subsidiary seconds dial at XII, again set within an elaborately engraved dial mask. 

When describing Dent carriage clocks, Derek Roberts notes (op.cit, p. 305) “The quality of carriage clocks produced by Dent was always of a very high order. Many of them incorporated chronometer escapements and an indication of their refinement is that some even provided for mid-range temperature compensation. Indeed the standard of work is indistinguishable from that of the their best chronometers.” The present carriage clock is no exception. It was made in circa 1855 or possibly slightly later, not long after the death of Edward John Dent (1790-1853), the firm’s illustrious founder. At that time, the famous London business was being run by E. J. Dent’s very able stepsons, namely Richard Edward (1817-56), who ran the concern at 33 Cockspur Street, and Frederick William (better known as Frederick; 1808-60) who ran the company’s other business at 61 Strand and at 34 Royal Exchange, as signed on the present dial. Frederick and his younger brother Richard were the children of E. J. Dent’s second wife Elizabeth née Davis (1783-1865) and her first and deceased husband, a reputed watchmaker Richard Rippon (1767-1835). It was Rippon, who had given E. J. Dent his first instructions in clock and watchmaking and for whom E. J. Dent worked for, from 1810 until about 1814, when he set up on his own at 43 King Street, London. Following this, in 1830 E. J. Dent began a partnership with John Roger Arnold, trading at 84 Strand. When the partnership was dissolved in 1840, Dent again set up on his own, trading from 82 Strand.

Dent’s name is one of the most important in the development of English clockmaking. During its long history the firm created some of the finest precision instruments. And, as one of the key players in the quest for accurate timekeeping at sea, the firm created a series of precision chronometers used by the Royal Navy as well as maritime explorers. Dent was also at the forefront of technical innovation as the creator of the standard clock at the Royal Observatory in Greenwich, which was to maintain Greenwich Meantime (G.M.T.) and thereafter was used as a standard by all others in the Empire. It continued to do so until it was replaced in 1946 by the electric clock. Over and above its repute for precision timekeeping, Dent is probably better known as the maker of the world’s most famous clock – the great clock for the Houses of Parliament in London. This clock, now associated with the chimes of Big Ben, was begun in 1852 but was still in its genesis at the time of E. J. Dent’s death, when as noted, the concern was continued by his stepsons, Frederick and Richard who, for practical reasons, changed their surnames from Rippon to Dent. 

As one can see, the dial and backplate feature addresses for 61 Strand and 34 Royal Exchange in London. These were the two concerns that were run by Frederick Dent between the years 1853 (when his stepfather died) and 1860 (when he himself died). Frederick was a fine maker. In 1822, at the age of fourteen, he began a seven-year apprenticeship under Benjamin Lewis Vulliamy, and in 1831, he was granted the Freedom of the Clockmaker’s Company. By 1832 he was working for the newly formed partnership between Arnold and Dent, where he proved instrumental in instigating some of the firm’s experiments in glass balance springs. Among Frederick’s finest and later creations was the great galvanic chronographic apparatus, made for the Royal Observatory at Greenwich in 1854. The following year he constructed and erected the new standard astronomical clock for the Radcliffe Observatory at Oxford University. He also made and installed a similar astronomical clock for the Royal Observatory of Scotland in Edinburgh in 1856, while in 1857 he made a turret clock for Queen Victoria’s Scottish residence at Balmoral. 

Frederick Dent lived at 61 Strand with his wife Louisa, who died at the age of forty-six, in 1858. Without his wife and any children, Frederick found solace in drink, which eventually led to his own death in 1860. Vaudrey Mercer, in “The Life and Letters of Edward John Dent, Chronometer Maker, and Some Account of His Successors”, 1977, discusses in detail the complexities of Frederick’s will. It was not properly drawn up and allowed for the possibility that Frederick’s large estate, including much of the business, might pass to his executor Edmund Denison rather than a member of the Dent family. There followed a lengthy lawsuit, at the end of which the judge pronounced that the main beneficiary was to be Frederick’s mother Elizabeth Dent and thus the Dent horological concern was to remain within the family. 

Following this, the business formerly run by Frederick at the Strand and at the Royal Exchange, was renamed E. Dent & Co, after his mother Elizabeth. Either then or soon after it became a partnership, whose members included Frederick’s sister Amelia Lydia Sophia Gardener, née Rippon (1814-1881) and Frederick’s brother-in-law Thomas Buckney (1799-1873). It was subsequently continued by Thomas Buckney senior’s son, Thomas Buckney junior (1838-1900). Meanwhile Dent’s business at Cockspur Street, formerly run by Richard until his death in 1856, had been renamed after Richard’s widow Marianna Frederica and thus became ‘M. F. Dent’. It continued to trade from Cockspur Street up until 1921, when M. F. Dent was amalgamated into E. Dent. 

Throughout most of its history, Dent used a numbering system. At times this has provided a very useful reference but on other occasions it has led to much confusion. For instance, there is no consistency between the series of numbers used for watches, carriage clocks, chronometers or other precision pieces, nor does there seem to be any tally between those pieces that were produced and sold at different premises. In their books, both Vaudrey Mercer and Charles Allix give a fairly comprehensive list of known, numbered Dent carriage clocks. Unfortunately, the present clock, numbered 1892, is not included in either publication. However, we do know of other Dent carriage clocks that are of a similar date including numbers 1503 and 1567 (cited by Allix and Roberts, see above) as well as Dent 20338 and 21245, which are both signed on the dial 33 Cockspur Street, London. 

Despite the death of the firm’s founder Edward John Dent in 1853, the business maintained the same high standard of horological excellence, as evidenced by their continued appointment as clockmakers to Queen Victoria. In addition, the firm also received commissions from Prince Albert and later from King Edward VI, George V and Queen Mary. They also held appointments to the Russian Tsars and Emperor Meiji of Japan in addition to being appointed to the courts and governments of France, Germany Italy, Austria, Spain, the United States and others.