The Dirty Dozen: The Story

"The Dirty Dozen" is a 1967 film about 12 soldiers sentenced to prison or death, selected by a US Marine general to carry out a suicide mission in France during World War II.
But, in the world of military watches, the term " The dirty dozen " has a whole other meaning.

It all started in 1939 , when in view of the Second World War, the British Minister of Defence began to look for manufacturers of timepieces for the soldiers . The commitment of the English industries to the production of watches for the Air Force and the Navy shifted the attention of the minister to the watch manufacturers in Switzerland , which proved to be very skilled in producing resistant watches for the daily life of the military.

The Minister of Defense selected the manufacturers according to specific requirements: shockproof glass, water resistance, black dial, illuminated hands and hours, stainless steel case. In 1945 twelve manufacturers exported 150,000 examples of watches classified "General Service" to Great Britain: Omega , Jaeger-LeCoultre , IWC Schaffhausen , Lemania , Cyma , Buren , Longines , Eterna , Vertex , Record , Timor and Grana . Originally there were 13 manufacturers but Enicar was excluded from the selection for unknown reasons.

How to Find and Recognize Them

Each watch has engravings on the back: The broad arrow , a symbol that first appeared in 1585 in the coat of arms of Sir Philip Sidney, then used to identify government assets, is also present on the internal case in these watches. The 3Ws were the acronym for Watch, Wrist, Waterproof for types of watches other than military ones. Finally, we find a military serial number with a letter followed by a number of up to 5 digits and another civil serial number engraved under the military number or, in some watches, inside the case.

The search for these original watches is very fun and rewarding for collectors, although there are pitfalls around the corner. Very few collectors in the world own the entire original collection.

When a watch was broken, the REME (corps of Royal Electrical & Mechanical Engineers) did not care to preserve the originality of the watches but rather to send them back into the field as soon as possible, often using lower quality components or even taken from other watches . Furthermore, in the 1960s, some of these models were changed because radioactive substances such as radium and promethium were present inside the dial.

Most of these watches are quite easy to find on the web , paying attention to details it is possible to find most of the dirty dozen at a good price and in original condition. The rarest to find are the Vertex and the Grana, sold around $7,000, they take months or maybe years to be found. This is more for a factor of aesthetics than production, in fact, the most beautiful objects to the eye are those that always have a good market.