I went out recently to have dinner with a good friend and her family. We were chatting after polishing off a rather nice dessert when she disappeared from the table, coming back a couple of minutes later with a small leather pouch in her hand. “Here you are, call it a wedding present”, she said.

I took my present out of the pouch, and it turned out to be a 1950’s Jaeger LeCoultre Memovox travel clock, in a lovely stainless steel and brass case with a folding cover/stand. It has two signed JLC crowns and is about 37mm x 46mm in size. We tested the alarm, which functions perfectly, and it took just a couple of small winds for it to spring into life.

The clock belonged to my friends father, who died in 1962. He’d had it for a few years by then, since which time it’s sat in a drawer, never being wound or used until now.