Thomas Quaife, Sussex – 1840
£2,750.00
Thomas Quaife (1806–1889) was one of the more enterprising Sussex horologists of the mid-19th century. Probably born at Mountfield (though recorded in the 1871 census as Whatlington), he was trading in Battle by 1833 and listed as a watchmaker in 1839. By 1849 he had established himself on Hastings Road, almost opposite Loose Farm, where contemporary directories describe him not merely as a watchmaker but as a watch manufacturer — suggesting small-scale production rather than simple retail or repair. Although retained to maintain the church clock at three guineas per annum until at least 1843, his commercial focus appears to have been watches. In 1853 he patented a method of forming watch cases by pressure, and later exhibited a chiming clock of marble and gold with fifty changes at the Great Exhibition of 1862 — a mark of considerable ambition and technical confidence.
The present clock, dating to circa 1840, represents Quaife’s earlier provincial output. It has an 11-inch square painted dial, decorated with stylised conch shells to the spandrels and a rural vignette of church and cottage to the centre — a charming Sussex pastoral motif of the period. The mahogany case, of rich chestnut tone, is topped with the distinctive Sussex scrolling wave crest to the pediment, anchoring it firmly in its regional tradition. At £2,750, it offers an attractive opportunity to acquire a documented Sussex maker whose career bridges the transition from traditional provincial clockmaking to the more industrialised watch production of the later 19th century.
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