Object Description
A Very Fine Small Georgian Longcase Domestic Regulator.
Twelve inch silvered dial signed ‘John Byard,
London’, with original blued steel hands and subsidiary seconds dial.
Massive six pillar eight day movement with dead beat escapement, bolt and shutter maintaining power and flat steel rod pendulum with engraved regulation nut and large brass bob.
The elegant restrained case with shallow arched pediment and similarly shaped rectangular trunk door veneered with finely figured wood and panelled plinth with shaped apron. C.1790
John Byard was born c.1742, baptised 2nd November 1742 at St Mary’s, Whitechapel, son of Thomas and Patience Byard. He was apprenticed to Stephen Stokes, master watchmaker of St James, Westminster for seven years. He was married in 1767 to Mary Wilkinson at St Andrews church, Holborn. He appears to have been working on his own in Bloomsbury, London from c.1765-1807. He is found listed in trade directories as a clockmaker in Kentish Town from 1802 to 1807.