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Gould, the man who knew (almost) everything Jonathan Betts Senior Specialist, Horology Royal Observatory National Maritime Museum, Greenwich 1 NATIONAL MARITIME MUSEUM 3 Great Clarendon Street, Oxford OX2 6DP Oxford University Press is a department of the University of Oxford. It furthers the University’s objective of excellence in research, scholarship, and education by publishing worldwide in Oxford New York Auckland Cape Town Dar es Salaam Hong Kong Karachi Kuala Lumpur Madrid Melbourne Mexico City Nairobi New Delhi Shanghai Taipei Toronto With offices in Argentina Austria Brazil Chile Czech Republic France Greece Guatemala Hungary Italy Japan Poland Portugal Singapore South Korea Switzerland Thailand Turkey Ukraine Vietnam Oxford is a registered trade mark of Oxford University Press in the UK and in certain other countries Published in the United States by Oxford University Press Inc., New York © National Maritime Museum 2006 The moral rights of the author have been asserted Database right Oxford University Press (maker) First published 2006 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior permission in writing of Oxford University Press, or as expressly permitted by law, or under terms agreed with the appropriate reprographics rights organization. Enquiries concerning reproduction outside the scope of the above should be sent to the Rights Department, Oxford University Press, at the address above You must not circulate this book in any other binding or cover and you must impose the same condition on any acquirer British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data Data available Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data Betts, Jonathan. Time restored : the Harrison timekeepers and R.T. Gould, the man who knew (almost) everything / Jonathan Betts. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN-13: 978–0–19–856802–5 (alk. paper) ISBN-10: 0–19–856802–9 (alk. paper) 1. Gould, Rupert Thomas, 1890–1948. 2. Chronometers. 3. Nautical instruments. I. Title. TS544.8.G68B48 2006 681.1Ј18092—dc22 2006000426 Typeset by Newgen Imaging Systems (P) Ltd., Chennai, India Printed in Great Britain on acid-free paper by Biddles Ltd., King’s Lynn ISBN 0–19–856802–9 978–0–19–856802–5 13579108642 F This page intentionally left blank Contents Preface and Acknowledgements ix Introduction: Rupert T. Gould 1 1. Childhood 1890–1905 6 2. Navy Training 1906–1913 28 3. The War, a Breakdown, and Marriage 1914–1920 57 4. John Harrison and the Marine Chronometer 81 5. Research and the First Restorations 1920–1922 104 6. The Magnum Opus 1921–1923 117 7. Horology: The Obsession 127 8. H2 is Restored 1923–1925 135 9. The Sette of Odd Volumes 147 10. Separation 1925–1927 164 11. Oddities and Enigmas 1928–1929 186 12. The Case for the Sea Serpent 1930 201 13. The RAS Regulator 1927–1929 208 14. H3 is Completed 1929–1931 221 15. H1 the Full Restoration 1931–1933 235 16. The Loch Ness Monster 1933–1934 249 17. The Harrison Timekeepers and the NMM 1934–1935 262 18. Professor Stewart, the BBC, and Tennis 1936 272 19. Many Projects 1936–1937 288 20. Leaving Downside, Leaving London 1937–1939 309 21. Upper Hurdcott and The Brains Trust 1940–1945 321 22. Canterbury and a Gold Medal 1945–1948 343 References and Notes 361 A . Gould Bibliography 389 A . Recommended Reading 398 A . Summary of contents of the Harrison Notebooks and the later work 401 viii Contents A . Summary and comment on Oddities and Enigmas 406 A .The Affair of the Queen’s watch 430 A . Glossary of Horological Terms 442 Index 447 Front end paper: Associated places in Britain Back end paper: Rupert Gould’s family tree Preface and Acknowledgements Rupert Gould was an achiever in many varied fields. My interest in him, naturally enough, has always been principally focused on his work in Horology: the study of timekeeping and time telling. One of the most frequently asked questions we horologists face is ‘How did you first get into that’? Looking at my friends and colleagues in the professional horological world, it seems to be the case, at least these days, that most come into the subject from other occupations, more often than not in early middle age. Sadly, there are very few youngsters in the world of horology. I myself however, was one, once. At the tender age of eleven, in the mid-1960s, I decided to opt out of the family camping holidays in the New Forest and asked my father for a holiday job in the family business. Betts Ltd was a firm of wholesale and retail watchmakers and jewellers, based in Ipswich in Suffolk, but with a number of branches round the country. As an errand boy, I would run between the three retail shops round the town and the company’s watch repair workshops carrying bags full of customers’ watches for repair (it wouldn’t be allowed today!). Having an inclination towards mechan- ical things, I took an interest in what the men behind the benches were working on, and one of the watchmakers, Philip Hancock, was asked to look after me. Patiently he showed me the ropes, supplying me with large ex-government pocket watches to have a go with and, I believe, I didn’t make too bad a job of cleaning them and getting them together again. I do know that I was immediately hooked, and never had any doubts about what I wanted to do when I was older. It was not long after that I first heard the name of John Harrison, through a family friend, Kit Welford (who was also our GP). Welford was a keen sailor: he vainly tried to interest me and my four siblings in the joys of getting cold and wet (in spite of my employment at the National Maritime Museum, I’m afraid I have never been able to discover a pas- sion for boats). Hearing of my new-found interest in clocks, he urged me to visit Greenwich and pay homage to the great timekeepers by John Harrison ‘the most important clocks ever constructed’. He also alluded to the fact that, had it not been for the dedication of a retired Navy Officer, they may not have survived at all, though I was not told this man’s name, nor what it was he had done to save them. x Preface and Acknowledgements At the time the family had a flat in Marylebone in London where we stayed sometimes over holidays, and it was during one of these visits that I made the first pilgrimage to the Royal Observatory, Greenwich (ROG) and the National Maritime Museum (NMM). The historic Royal Obser- vatory, intimately linked with the history of clocks, watches, and chronometers, was my first port of call. For nearly three hundred years it was the home of the Astronomer Royal who, in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, was tasked with developing an astronomical solution to the greatest scientific problem of the age: finding the Longitude, ones east-west position, when at sea. The Observatory was also where, in about 1728, John Harrison had first visited when seeking his fortune. He too was developing a solution to the Longitude problem, but by creating marine timekeepers, of which much more will be said in this book. The professional astronomers had moved out of the Observatory after the Second World War and, when I first visited in 1968, the buildings had just been restored and fully reopened as a museum. In those days the buildings were called the Old Royal Observatory and it had recently become an outstation of the NMM. Standing for the first time at the centre of these buildings in Christopher Wren’s Flamsteed House, I found the sense of history quite overwhelming. There are few buildings standing today with such intimate and direct links to the history of precision clock making. In 1968 however, the Harrison timekeepers were displayed ‘down the hill’, in the Navigation Gallery in the South West wing of the National Maritime Museum. So, following a visit to the horological ‘Mecca’ of Greenwich Observatory, a stroll down through Greenwich Park was necessary to take in the four ‘Holy Grails’ of our subject. Needless to say, I soon understood Dr Welford’s insistence that I see the Harrison timekeepers. Others have described first setting eyes on them as akin to a religious experience. They are truly astonishing machines and, nearly forty years on, they still have the ability to amaze and thrill me. What they led to, the developed marine chronometer, is also a pretty amazing instrument. Made to the highest standards of horological craftsman- ship, the chronometer is the most carefully made, the most beautifully finished and yet the most delicately vulnerable of horological instru- ments; it is the ‘aristocrat’ of the clock-making world. I would visit Greenwich many times more in my youth, never imagining for a moment that one day I might be lucky enough to work Preface and Acknowledgements xi at the museum and actually have the Harrison timekeepers themselves, among many other chronometers, in my care.