Eight-Day, Escapement Visible Front and Back, c.1913-1920
This Louisine-signed pocket watch runs on the Hebdomas movement, the 8-day design patented by Irenee Aubry in Switzerland in 1888 and taken up by Schild & Co. of La Chaux-de-Fonds, one of the most recognisable movements of the early 20th century. Rather than winding it every day, one wind carries it through the week.
The movement shows itself on both sides. Open the gunmetal case back and the barrel itself is visible and engraved, and it visibly rotates as you wind. The barrel plate carries the exhibition medals the design won in Geneva (1896), Paris (1900), Chicago (1892), Milan (1906) and Brussels (1910), a genuine record of the watch's reputation at the time. On the dial side, a cut-out reveals the balance wheel and escapement in motion, the "levees visibles" feature named directly on the movement.
The case is a substantial 51.5mm, open-face, in gunmetal over brass, with honest wear at the high points (bow, crown, edges) rather than any dents or damage. The dial is gilt guilloche with individually set Arabic numeral roundels and multilingual "8 day" markings for Germany, France, Spain and Italy, evidence of how widely this design was exported. Hands are set with a small pusher rather than a pull-out crown, a detail specific to Hebdomas watches made before 1920 and a useful marker of this piece's age.
Serial number 2436 is stamped inside the case back. The watch winds and runs well, the crystal is clean with no cracks or chips, and there's no rattling or looseness anywhere. No box or papers accompany it.
A genuinely different kind of pocket watch: an 8-day power reserve, a visible rotating barrel, and a visible escapement, all in one case.
