THE HISTORY of time itself is being celebrated this week to mark the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee.

Hundreds of people are expected to flock to Deacon & Son jewellers, in Old Town, and Steam Museum on Saturday morning when the limited edition pocket watch they have produced as a joint venture goes on sale.

The Great Western Railway owned a wide variety of time-keeping pieces, from guards’ pocket watches and mantel clocks, to giant clocks on stations and the famous steam-powered hooter at Swindon Works.

Keeping accurate time was important to the railway company – to keep trains running on time for customers and to make sure GWR employees got to work on time.

And now, a year after a chance conversation between jeweller Richard Deacon and museums and heritage manager Alan Greer, three limited edition pocket watches have been unveiled.

Ian Surtees, Steam commercial manager, said: “This new and exclusive pocket watch is reminiscent of the classical style of earlier timepieces supplied to the Great Western Railway by the Deacon & Son back in the 1850s.

“The museum is proud to present this exquisite pocket watch to collectors and GWR enthusiasts to mark this special year.”

Mr Deacon said it had been a pleasure to work on the joint project with the museum.

“The project has rekindled past ties between Deacons and the railways and helps us celebrate the town’s rich railway history,” he said.

“I feel it is so appropriate because my forbearers came to Swindon to keep the trains on time and it is nice to be able to still be here in the same location to work on this very exciting project.

“There some conversation about whether or not to use a traditional mechanical movement.

“But we felt that it was appropriate because the original watches sold to the railway in the Victorian times would have been mechanical. Also over the last decade there has been much more interest in mechanical watches and clocks than the previous 20 years before that – the measure of keeping time has very much gone back to its roots.”

The three versions of the 17 jewel GWR pocket watch are the Open Face Chrome Plated, the Chrome Plated Half Hunter and the Gold Plated Half Hunter, which are all priced between £69.95 and £99.99.

Mr Deacon said: “We have 1,000 of each of the three watches and we are confident that they will sell not just locally, but nationally and internationally.

“Obviously the people who collect railway items will probably want to buy theirs from Steam, while people who collect time and local history will want to come to Deacons.”

The pocket watches will be on sale at Deacons, in Wood Street, from 9am on Saturday and from Steam at 10am. s