Queen Anne Orders Payment to the Official Watchmaker and Clockmaker to the Late King, William III

King William III died on March 8, 1702 and was succeeded by Queen Anne, his Sister-in-Law. During much of his reign and at his death, the official Clockmaker and Watchmaker to the King was Thomas Herbert.  He was almost surely a relative, perhaps a nephew, of Sir Thomas Herbert, Clockmaker and Watchmaker to King Charles I. The latter gave his own watch to Sir Thomas on his way to his execution.

This was an incredibly early period of clockmaking.  Although forms of time keeping devices had been around for a couple of centuries, the pendulum clock had not been invented until the 2nd half of the 17th century.  The first English society of clockmakers had not even been founded until the late 1630s.   Herbert's tasks included not only the creation of timekeeping devices, but as a petition he filed to receive pay due to him for his services states, "He had mended, looked after, and kept in order the King's clocks in his private lodgings and palaces as well as the great clock at Hampton Court." He had also done so at Whitehall, Windsor, Newmarket, Kensington, and Richmond, among other places, another petition explains.

When William died, Herbert had yet to be paid, as it seems William had left debts to be settled from a sinking fund during Queen Anne's reign.

Order signed Anne R, London,October 20, 1713, to Robert Earl, High Treasurer, directing him to dispense sums to John Holbech, who managed the King's finances, to be dispensed to Thomas Herbert.  "Our will and pleasure is that out of our money in the receipt of our Exchequer applicable to the uses of the Civil Government, grown due beofre the 8th day of March 1701/2 you issue and pay or cause to be issued and paid unto our trusty and well beloved John Holbech Gent the Sum of one hundred pounds… due at midsummer 1701 as he was clockmaker and watchmaker to our late Royal Brother King William the Third, according to an establishment signed by his said late Majesty in that behalf.” A line with Herbert’s name is lost at the fold, but at bottom the document states, “Mr. Holbech 100 upon account to be paid over to Thomas Herbert Esq."

Our research discloses no other documents having reached the public sale marketplace relating to watchmaking or clockmaking, signed by a royal figure, that are earlier than this one, in at least forty years.