John Jefferys (1701 – 1754) parents, John, a wool merchant and Jane Jefferys lived in a house called Darbies in the village of Midgham in the parish of Thatcham in Berkshire. He had at least five brothers and one sister. Although his father was a Quaker, he was christened on the 18th of March 1701.
On 4 November 1717 he began an apprenticeship with watchmaker Edward Jagger at Well Close Square, Stepney, London. After nine years of teaching on the 26th of January 1726 he became a member of the Clockmakers Company of London. In 1735 he took Larcum Kendall as a new apprentice. In 1739 a cater-cousin of John’s, fourteen year old Jethro Tull of Buttons, Midgham, also joined Larcum and was apprenticed to John for the term of seven years at a cost of forty guineas to Jethro’s father Richard. Around 1753 he built a pocket watch for watchmaker John Harrison. This watch was one of the inspirations for Harrison to concentrate on building a watch sized piece for competing for the Longitude Prize. Now the watch is owned by Trinity House and on view in the Clockmakers’ Company museum. Little work is by Jefferys is found today, mostly because, as a ‘repeating motion maker’, he was part of the highly skilled craftsmen of individual watch parts. Latter supplied the ‘finishers’ and watch retailers and seldom signed their work themselves.
Unfortunately John Jefferys never saw the benefits or consequence’s of his creation as he died in 1754. After his death, Larcum Kendall took over his business and workshop and continued to work for John Harrison and later the Admiralty. (A)
Antiquarian Horology 