“But where is the back?”
“I can’t exactly say; some is on the Birmingham platform, some at Stafford where I changed, there is quite a lot on the platform here, and I noticed pieces kept falling off as I followed this man wheeling it from the station; but whoever looks at the back of a clock? You can easily fit in another without anybody being the wiser.”
I then saw the dial and works, and found I was face to face with Grandfather Philip Smith of Barton, which Barton I cannot say, but probably near Nottingham. I did my best for him, and he has done his best for me, so I am recompensed for the expense I was put to in renewing his youth.
“Sergeant, just sweep up that dust in the hall.”
“Yes, sir.”
I now received a welcome gift of two high-backed Lancashire Cromwellian black oak chairs from a revered friend, who was wishful to encourage my new craze, and very useful and instructive these have been. I say instructive, for they had not been in the shadow of “old Burgess” long before I compared the grain of their oak and his, with the result that while the panel in the back and front leg spindle of one was finely carved, and the oak undoubtedly 17th century, in the other they were as modern as the frames. I may here mention for the benefit of any reader who does not know that old oak furniture is seldom black with age, and that the polisher can stain it any shade preferred, that when Nelson’s flagship, the Foudroyant, built in 1797, was wrecked at Blackpool in 1897, much of her oak was made into furniture, and some fine chairs quite light in colour may be seen at the Hotel Metropole there. I have a black gate-legged table made from Foudroyant oak which is an exact replica of a good Cromwellian design with twisted legs, and which was quite light in colour until it was stained (Plates [X] and [XI]).
I now had another oak grandfather clock with a brass dial offered me, and although it had a thirty-hour movement I did not hesitate to pay the price asked. It had come from Ormskirk, where it was made by T. Helm about 1770, as in the Constable’s book of accounts for that year there is an entry “paid Thos. Helm for taking care of clock.” It stood for a hundred years in a farm opposite my house, and I got it from descendants of its original owners, so for sentimental reasons I would not part with it, even at an advance on the first cost. This clock originally was worked by a rope, but a chain was substituted before I became its possessor. I have other things to talk of than grandfather clocks, but three were not enough for me. I have from time to time provided room for others, and for the last few years have found nine none too many, as seven of them need winding only once a week. They do not all strike at once, for a few have been deprived of their capacity for music-making, by having the striking weight taken off.
By the aid of the photographs and with the following particulars the reader has a fair illustration of the evolution of the external part of grandfather clocks extending over one hundred years. I believe the dates I estimate are not far off the mark, and I hope some readers may be enabled to set their minds at rest if they have been in doubt as to the age of their own grandfather.