IDENTITY STATEMENT
Reference code(s): GB 0074 CLC/B/227-163
Held at: London Metropolitan Archives
Title: SILLS, Edwin Robert (d 1943)
Date(s): 1901-1920
Level of description: Collection
Extent: Two production units.
Name of creator(s): Sills | Edwin Robert | d 1943 | watch and chronometer finisher
CONTEXT
Administrative/Biographical history:
Edwin Robert Sills (d 1943) was a watch and chronometer finisher of 21 Foyle Road, Tottenham. His father, William Sills, was a noted finisher of marine chronometers; his grandfather, also William Sills, was a Coventry watchmaker who came to London in 1840 and took up marine chronometer finishing. When demand for marine chronometers fell off after the First World War, Edwin Sills turned to watch and pocket chronometer finishing, producing work for Victor Kullberg in particular.
At the time of the 1901 census, Edwin Sills was working with his father as a watch finisher from their home at 31 Cressington Road, Stoke Newington. By 1942/3, and almost certainly earlier, he was working at 21 Foyle Road, Tottenham.
CONTENT
Scope and content/abstract:
Job order books of Edwin Robert Sills, watch and chronometer finisher.
ACCESS AND USE
Language/scripts of material: English
System of arrangement:
Two volumes.
Conditions governing access:
Available for general access.
Conditions governing reproduction:
Copyright to this collection rests with the depositor.
Finding aids:
Please see online catalogues at: http://search.lma.gov.uk/opac_lma/index.htm
ARCHIVAL INFORMATION
Archival history:
Immediate source of acquisition:
These records were purchased by the Clockmakers' Company at an auction of the library of Professor David Torrens of Dublin. The Clockmakers' Company deposited them in the Manuscripts Section of Guildhall Library in 1973, together with the archives of other watch and clockmakers, as follows: Victor Kullberg, watch and chronometer maker of Islington; Joseph Preston and Sons, watch, clock and chronometer makers, of Prescott, Lancashire; and Heinrich Otto's lecture notes on watchmaking. The Guildhall Library Manuscripts Section merged with the London Metropolitan Archives in 2009.
ALLIED MATERIALS
Related material:
CLC/L/CD for the Worshipful Company of Clockmakers.
Publication note:
See Horological Journal, vol 85, June 1943, for an obituary of Edwin Sills.
DESCRIPTION NOTES
Archivist's note:
Date(s) of descriptions: January to May 2011.