Dec 6, 2021
The Story of the World’s Most Famous Reversible Watch
History’s most famous reversible wristwatch would never have been invented were it not for Joseph Ford Sherer, then a lieutenant in the 44th Regiment of Sylhet Light Infantry of the East India Company’s army. The story begins in the middle of the 19th century in Manipur, a state in east British India, where Lieutenant Sherer observes locals play a game known as sagol kangjei. Translating as “horse hockey”, the game was long played by local royalty. The game has players on horseback wielding sticks to hit a ball across a rectangular field. The Lieutenant reported his observations to his boss, Captain Robert Stewart. The two men eventually began to play the game, which evolved into what is now known as polo. In March 1859 Sherer and Stewart established their own polo club, Silchar Kangjai Club, and four years later the earliest written rulebook for polo was. With that, the pair started a long tradition of polo-playing among British soldiers in India. And soon polo would find its way around the world with polo-playing soldiers across the Commonwealth – the first polo match was played in Europe sometime in the late 1860s. Lieutenant Joseph Sherer, Assistant to the Superintendent of Cachar (second from left), with his bearers, Manipur, 1861. Image – National Army Museum As the game grew in popularity, a problem arose: polo players would often damage the crystals on their wristwatches, sometimes with errant mallets. During a visit to India in 1930, César de Trey ...
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