The Longines Pocket Watch
You might not associate Longines primarily with pocket watches — the brand is better known today for elegant wristwatches and as the official timekeeper at equestrian events — but the history is the other way round entirely. Longines spent the first sixty or seventy years of its existence almost exclusively making pocket watches, and during the period roughly from 1880 to 1920, it was arguably the largest and most technically advanced watch manufacturer in Switzerland. The wristwatches came later. The pocket watches came first, and they remain some of the most satisfying Swiss antiques a collector can own.
The Meadow Where Watches Grew
The Longines story begins in 1832, when Auguste Agassiz — brother of the biologist Louis Agassiz — joined an established watchmaking comptoir in Saint-Imier, a small town in the Swiss Jura mountains. The Jura had been a watchmaking centre since the seventeenth century: the combination of agricultural downtime in winter, skilled hands, and proximity to the Geneva and Basel finishing trades had made the valley's workshops a natural supplier to watch merchants across Europe. Agassiz entered an industry with deep local roots, and he found immediate success exporting to the American market through family contacts.
The critical figure in transforming the business was Agassiz's nephew, Ernest Francillon, who joined in 1852 and took effective control around 1862. Francillon was trained as an economist rather than a watchmaker, which proved to be exactly the right background for what came next. He had studied the American watch factories — the Waltham model of centralised, mechanised production — and decided to replicate it in Switzerland. In 1866 he purchased a plot of land on the right bank of the river Suze, on the outskirts of Saint-Imier, in an area known locally as Es Longines: the long meadows. He built a factory there, inaugurated it in 1867, and named the company after the field. The winged hourglass logo — still Longines' trademark today and the oldest registered watch trademark still in active use — appeared on movements from that same year.
The First Movements
The factory produced its first in-house movement in 1867: the Calibre 20A, a 20-ligne movement with anchor escapement and pendant winding. It won an award at the Paris Universal Exhibition that same year. The numbered serial record begins at this point — Longines assigned a serial number to every movement from the very first, and has maintained that record continuously ever since, making it one of the best-documented watch companies in history.
The move to mechanised production brought immediate results. Where the établissage system had been the norm — components made by individual craftsmen in their homes, assembled in workshops — Francillon brought every stage under one roof and introduced precision tooling and steam power. By the early 1900s the factory employed over a thousand people and was producing watches for distribution worldwide. In the late nineteenth and early twentieth century, Longines was probably the most important Swiss watch manufacturer by volume, having surpassed even the established prestige houses.
Timing Sport — the Chronograph Legacy
In 1878, at the request of Longines' American agent in New York, the company produced its first chronograph pocket watch: the Calibre 20H, a monopusher in which a single push on the crown started the centre seconds hand, a second push stopped it, and a third returned it to zero. It was exhibited at the Paris Exposition Universelle that year and won a gold medal. From this beginning, Longines built a reputation in precision timing that would eventually take it to horse racing events, aviation record attempts, and the Olympic Games — but it all started with an American agent's request for a pocket-watch chronograph.
The 1913 Calibre 13.33Z was the first wristwatch chronograph movement ever produced by any manufacturer — a remarkable achievement, and technically demanding given how much smaller a wristwatch movement is than a pocket watch one. By 1916 Longines had developed a stopwatch measuring to the 1/10th of a second. These advances in chronograph technology came directly out of the pocket watch programme; the expertise was transferred from one format to the other.
The American Connection — Wittnauer
Longines appointed the A. Wittnauer Company as their exclusive American sales agent in 1880, a relationship that would last 114 years. The Wittnauer connection was so durable and prominent that many Americans encountered the two names together — "Longines-Wittnauer" — and assumed the companies were the same. They were not: Longines made the movements, Wittnauer sold them. The names remained linked until 1994. For a collector, a Longines pocket watch that passed through Wittnauer is a typical American-market piece; the movement archive at Saint-Imier records which distributor each movement was originally invoiced to, so researchers can trace a Wittnauer-sold Longines back to its original invoice date.
Key Pocket Watch Calibres
Longines used a calibre designation system based on ligne size and variant number. The 19-ligne family, developed during the 1890s–1910s, is the workhorse of Longines pocket watch collecting:
- Calibre 19.70 / 19.70N — a finely finished full-plate movement used in superior pocket watches. The "N" suffix indicates the Nouveau (later) version. Known for elegant finger bridges that influenced later Swiss movement designers. Used in high-grade pieces from the period roughly 1890–1920.
- Calibre 19.71N — a closely related variant, frequently found in military watches, including WWII-era examples with the D433H military designation. Well-adjusted, robust movements that have survived a century of hard use in impressive numbers.
- Calibre 19.73 — another 19-ligne variant; differences from the 19.71 are primarily in bridge layout and regulator design.
- Calibre 20H — the original 1878 chronograph movement. A genuine antique when encountered; pieces from the 1878–1890 period are museum-quality objects.
- Calibre 18.79ZZ — an early movement invoiced to Wittnauer as early as 1902; encountered in American-market pieces of the Belle Époque era.
Early key-wound movements (pre-1880) use the 19B, 19M, and 19V designations — the first Longines calibres following the 20A. The 19B was key-wound because Francillon encountered production difficulties with stem-winding components at the required volume; by the late 1870s, stemwinding was standard across the range.
Serial Numbers and Dating
Longines' unbroken serial record from 1867 makes dating straightforward compared to most other makers. Serial numbers are on the movement — inside the caseback or on the movement plate. The numbering is sequential across all movements regardless of calibre, which means a single table covers everything. Longines themselves offer an Extract from the Archives service for watches over ten years old: submit the serial number and photographs, and they will return the exact invoice date, the calibre, and the original distributor. It is one of the most generous archival access policies in the watch industry.
| Serial Number | Approx. Year |
|---|---|
| 1 – 20,000 | 1867–1870 |
| 20,000 – 100,000 | 1870–1880 |
| 100,000 – 500,000 | 1880–1892 |
| 500,000 – 1,500,000 | 1892–1900 |
| 1,500,000 – 3,500,000 | 1900–1910 |
| 3,500,000 – 5,500,000 | 1910–1919 |
| 5,500,000 – 7,000,000 | 1919–1925 |
| 7,000,000 – 9,000,000 | 1925–1935 |
| 9,000,000 – 11,000,000 | 1935–1945 |
| 11,000,000 – 14,000,000 | 1945–1955 |
| 14,000,000 – 17,000,000 | 1955–1965 |
For the most precise dating, submit the serial number to Longines directly via longines.com/customer-service. The Extract from the Archives is free for watches over ten years old and typically gives the invoice date to the specific day.
What to Look For as a Collector
Longines pocket watches occupy a different collecting space from the American makers. Where a Hamilton or Waltham is valued primarily by grade (jewel count and movement finishing), Longines value is driven more by calibre, complication, age and dial quality. A Longines chronograph from the 1890s is a rare and serious object; an ordinary 19-ligne time-only pocket watch from 1920 is relatively plentiful and modest in value. Between those extremes lies most of the Longines pocket watch market.
Several categories particularly reward attention:
- Pre-1880 key-wound examples — early 19B and 19M movements in good original cases. Scarce, historically significant, and generally underpriced relative to equivalent American antiques.
- Late 19th-century enamel dial pieces — Longines produced pocket watches with exquisite painted enamel dials, often depicting landscapes or floral subjects. These are collected as much for the dial art as for the movement.
- Chronograph pocket watches (20H and later) — genuine antique Longines chronographs are serious collector items. The earlier the calibre, the more valuable.
- Military issue pieces — particularly WWII-era examples with the D433H designation and Calibre 19.71N movements. These were made to exacting standards and have usually been well-maintained.
- Sector-dial pocket watches — Longines produced a distinctive style of dial with a sector or fan-shaped layout for the hour numerals, typically in conjunction with an observation or navigation function. These are striking objects and sought by specialist collectors.