empressissi™ is pleased to offer this historic World War I military pocket watch commissioned by the British Air Ministry to make these Mark V Cockpit watches for pilots of the Royal Flying Corps (the predecessor to the Royal Air Force). Omega, Invicta, Doxa, Octava, Electa, and Zenith appear to have been the houses that received the largest orders from the Ministry, on average producing perhaps 7,000 Type V's each ans basically being the WW-1 version of the famous WW-2 'dirty dozen' - with just 'dirty seven' pocket watch designs/makers! There is a lot of speculation as to how many Mark V's were produced in total, with war historians placing the total number anywhere up to around 58,000 pieces of all manufacturers combined, thus many lost during the war, as over 35,000 such airplanes crashed. This is a non-luminous model which is even more rare than the often badly restored luminous models, I would guesstimate far less than 100 pieces survived.
The watch houses an early Swiss OMEGA hi grade 18-ligne gilt finish movement running on 17 jewels. It is cased in an original Nickel silver case marked appropriately for the Air ministry on the back with an internal 'Omega' dust cover, free bow and original crown.
The dial is a factory original, rare and unique 'reverse' enamel, where the numbers are in faded grey tone inlaid in black background for better night contrast flights. It comes with the original set of hands.
This one of a kind pocket watch measures 51.5mm side to side (excluding crown) and is a valuable historic artifact from the first world war.
