Images(3)

Clock movement

Dateca. 1810

Attributed to Thomas Brentnall

Signed by W. C. & J. Nicholas

OriginEngland, Birmingham

Mediumbrass, steel, and iron

Credit LineMuseum Purchase

Object number2015-269,B

DescriptionDial:
The 13 ¼”, one piece, arched iron dial is painted white with an oval seated portrait of a lady in a blue and white dress with a stick in her hand by water in the arch surrounded by painted beadwork and flanked by scrolls; pink flowers with green leaves painted in the spandrels; Arabic numerals for the hour numerals and second numerals (in 15, 30, 60 second intervals outside hour dial); "Brentnall" and "Sutton" painted above the winding holes; smaller dials above and below main hands, upper dial for seconds, lower dial for date. There are steel hour, minute, seconds, and calendar hands.

Movement:
Eight-day brass weight-driven movement measuring 6.75” H x 4.625” W. Plate thickness is 0.122” and clearance between front and back plates is 2.3”. Clock has an anchor-recoil escapement regulated by a seconds beat pendulum. A rack-and-snail strike sounds the hours on a 4” cast bell. The cast iron dial false plate has “W C & J Nicholas” cast at the top in block letters and “Birmingham” cast at the bottom in cursive.

Four brass pillars are riveted into the back plate and pinned at the front plate. The movement is fastened to the seat board by steel hooks that hook over the bottom movement pillars and are fastened under the seat board by nuts. The brass tube time and strike barrels are grooved for the weight cords. The steel clicks are threaded into the great wheels, and plain brass click springs are riveted in place. All time and strike train wheels have four-arm crossings. The time second wheel has a tapered steel arbor. All other wheel arbors are straight. The round steel crutch-rod has a closed-end fork. The pendulum bridge base is a butterfly shape. It is screwed to the back plate with two screws and two locator pins. The bell stand is screwed to the outside of the back plate. The conventional motion work is uncrossed.

Pendulum bob is cast iron with a brass face. Weights are cylindrical cast iron with cast in metal hooks. The weight pulleys are cast brass. The strike weight pulley has four cast holes.
Label TextThis tall case clock descended in the family of cabinetmaker William King of Georgetown, District of Columbia (now Maryland). Oral history within the family records that King received the clock’s works from the widow of a destitute clockmaker or retailer in exchange for a coffin and/or funerary services. As no other clocks by King are known, we can only assume that King’s shop made the clock to house these works. But as the design and construction of the case does relate to the work of John Shaw of Annapolis, with whom King apprenticed, it is likely by King. Like the clock from the Shaw shop, choice solid mahogany boards were used for the long case door and solid rather than veneered boards were used for the case sides.

The movement, labeled “Brentnall” and “Sutton” on the dial, was made by Thomas or possibly William Brentnall of Sutton Coldfield, England.

Colonial Williamsburg owns three other pieces of furniture by King: a sofa (1994-137, 1), side chair (1994-137, 2), and card table (1994-106). Each of these is slightly later in date than the clock. Tall case clocks of this date by Washington, DC makers are very rare and this is the only one attributed to King.
InscribedScratched into the front of the brass front plate, "By H Kriek/ 3053 M St Wash DC/ Ap 10-28". And in pencil on the top of the seat board "H Krick/ 3053 M st Wash/DC" with a possible date below that is illegible.

Harris Krieg was listed as a jeweler in the Washington DC 1920 city directory at 3053 M nw. (BOYD'S DIRECTORY OF THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA 1920 (Washington, DC: R. L. Polk & Co, 1920), p. 910))

"No 1848" scratched on back of pendulum bob.
Markings"Brentnall" and "Sutton" painted above the winding holes.

Cast into the back of the iron dial plate "W C & J NICHOLAS/ Birmingham" for William, Caleb, and Joshua Nicholas.
ProvenanceDescended in the family of cabinetmaker William King to client of vendor.

Exhibition(s)