Monday October 15, 1894

Dined with Clockmakers’ C^o in evening returning thanks for the Livery. Met M^r Buckney & had conversation with him about timeball at Sheerness, chronometers &c.

William Christie, Astronomer Royal

Capt. Close R.N. discussed plans for a timeball at Chatham. Anniversary dinner of R.S. Club.

William Christie, Astronomer Royal

RH says..... The Royal Observatory's time ball was installed in 1833 in order to give a visual time signal to ships on the Thames. This allowed them to check the chronometers they used - along with the astronomical lunar distance method - to find their longitude at see. The mechanism still works: the ball rising half-way up the pole at 12.55, to the top at 12.58 and dropping at 1pm. With the arrival of telegraphic time signals from Greenwich in the mid 19th century, other time balls were set up at various ports, including Deal, Southampton, Chatham and Falmouth. The archives in Cambridge show that these prompted much correspondence for Christie.

Friday May 11, 1894

M^r Loughborough came up about the colouring of the terracotta in the new Building contrary to specification. R.A.S. Council Evening meeting.

William Christie, Astronomer Royal

Mr Julitt West, Berlin, Engineer called to see arrangements for time signals. He called again on May 16 & went into details of several points – viz – comparison of clocks – construction of Mean Solar clock Shepherd – Method of correcting Mean Solar Clock for small errors – Registration of signals on Chronograph – Barometric correction of S. S. Clock – Method of dropping Time Ball.

Frank Dyson, Chief Assistant

RH says..... There is a clear difference in the colour of the terracotta on the later wings of the South Building, which may be what is referred to here. It is testament to the length of time it took to complete all four wings and to the difficulties that were encountered in supply of terracotta - frost and strikes had both caused severe delays.

Friday March 30, 1894

Two representatives from S. Smith & Sons called with reference to the supply of their non-magnetic watches for the Navy.

William Christie, Astronomer Royal

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RH says..... Samuel Smith's jewellery and watch-making business was founded in 1851 and quickly became renowned for producing fine precision chronometers. For the Royal Observatory, the testing of chronometers and deck watches for the Navy took up an enormous amount of their time, energies and even on-site space. Christie's archives in Cambridge testify to this - there are at least 24 sets of papers and correspondence devoted to chronometer business.

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The image accompanying this post is a pocket watch from about 1899 that was made by Emil Neilson[?] and supplied by S. Smith & Son. It is watertight but not, as far as I know, non-magnetic. This particular watch happens to have been used by one Robert Falcon Scott on his 1901-05 voyage on the Discovery and is currently on display in the National Maritime Museum's Oceans of Discovery gallery.

Friday March 16, 1894

A Post Office Official (M^r Shaw) called & discussed arrangements for a Wall letter-box to be fixed at the Observatory with collections at 12. 3 & 5, and also for 9 & 11pm. if Park keys could be supplied for use of postmen, It was arranged that the Postmaster of SE. District (D.H. Somerville Esq.) would communicate with me on the subject.
Arranged for Dallmeyer Photoheliograph & Hut to be mounted at once on Terrace roof of S. Wing of Physical Observatory.

William Christie, Astronomer Royal

RH says..... In this image, from about 1900, you can just make out the letter-box in the wall to the left hand side. In front of it, under the small protective shade, are the standard lengths available for the public to check their rulers and to the right of the gate is the 24-hour Shepherd Clock dial, displaying GMT to passers-by. The roof of Flamsteed House, Christie's residence, is bristling with meteorological equipment as well as the time ball, which is raised at 12.58 and drops at 1pm every day.

There is a gap in both journals for the next couple of days - and I am on leave from work - so I will meet you again on the 19th!

Sunday March 4, 1894

Returned from Sandwich this evening

William Christie, Astronomer Royal

RH says.... Not a great deal happened at the Royal Observatory on a Sunday that was not entirely routine and Christie evidently often went away over the weekend. Sandwich, a Kent port and home of the famous Royal St George's golf course, may have either been the home of a friend of relative, or Christie had a second house there. I've not yet seen anything in the RGO archives that mentions his connection Sandwich, so this is just a guess.

The routine work, that continued even on a Sunday, included the regular uninterrupted series of observations such as meterological readings, the daily photograph of the sun (depending on the weather) to record sunspot activity and, of course, time-determination observations and the maintenance of time-signals. From 1852 to 1893 the latter, sent by telegraph, were controlled by the Shepherd Master Clock, but from May 1893 this was superceded by a clock made by Dent & Co. (no. 2012), one of several made for the 1874 Transit of Venus expedition. It was very similar to the one pictured here, Dent 2016, which was adapted in 1923 to be used as the primary standard for the BBC's 'six-pip' time signal.

Incidentally, while Christie was off playing golf (or whatever he did do in Sandwich) this day saw the 219th anniversary (or 334th anniversary in 2009) of the Royal Warrant that officially appointed John Flamsteed as Astronomer Royal, or Charles II's "astronomical observator". See Greenwich Day-by-day for more Greenwich-related anniversaries like this.