Compass Museum - Pocket compasses

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- D -

DARTON

PROFILE - F. Darton bought their cases from Dennison of Birmingham and put their own inserts inside. They were a recognised supplier to the British War Department (now Ministry of Defence). The dial's design (Singer's patent) is identical with the Dennison compass below (click on the pict. for an enlarged view).

DEMARIA-LAPIERRE

PROFILE - Former French manufacturer (cameras) that produced among other companies a military version of the compass type Modèle 1922 (more information HERE).

(Click for enlarged view)

Military pocket compass featuring the same design as the famous Modèle 1922. The MILS were no longer indicated by four but only by two digits (compare with MORIN). This very simple basic design didn't permit to take as precise bearings as with the Modèle 1922 which was integrated in a case with an aiming device in the cover.

Technical Data
- Diameter: 55 mm
- Depth: 18 mm
- Weight: 65 gr

Transit lock on the side

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DENNISON

PROFILE - Former British manufacturer in Birmingham (more information HERE).

Pictures by courtesy of The Compasscollector (see LINKS)

(Click on picture for an enlarged view)

Mark V compass with SINGER's patent card design. It was superseded in the end of 1916 by the much more precise Mark VI design. Example : see W. Terrasse.

Technical Data
- Diameter: 45 mm
- Depth: 14 mm

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DIXEY

PROFILE - C. W. DIXEY were "Opticians to the Queen" and several compasses bear their signature. However, they had them made by other manufacturers like J & G SIMMS. They traded from 335 Oxford Street, 3 New Bond Sreet and from Old Bond Street in London from 1838 and 1862.

DOLLOND

PROFILE - British instruments manufacturer and retailer, now D&A, Dollond & Aitchison (more information HERE).

Box compass (early 1800's)

Click on pictures for enlarged views

Signature: Dollond London

Picture courtesy fatato81

Technical Data
- Diameter: 55 mm
- Height: 15 mm

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DOXA

PROFILE - Swiss / Japan ?
See also Wrist compasses

Technical Data
- Diameter: ... mm
- Depth: ... mm
- Weight: ... gr

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- E -

ESCHENBACH

PROFILE - German Manufacturer located in Nuremberg (more information HERE). See also Marching and Wrist compasses.

Technical Data
- Diameter: 45 mm
- Depth: 14 mm
- Weight: 36 gr
- Divisions: 360° clockwise
- Production: late 1970's
Typical WILKIE-made compass. This is easily recognizable because of the needle's shape and the stabilizing winglets (not to be seen on this picture because of the yellowish discolouration of the crystal.

(Click on picture at left for enlarged view)

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- F -

FRANCE

PROFILE - unidentified manufacturers

The smallest of all spring hunter type pocket compasses to date (see Definition in Miscellaneous / Terminology)

Technical Data
- Diameter: 1 in. / 25 mm
- Depth: 11 mm
- Weight: 19 gr

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- G -

GLASS, transparent rear face compasses

PROFILE - unidentified manufacturers - See also Burnat, S-L and Thalson.

	German compass with glass rear face, early 20th c. On the rear face, opposite to the letter S (south) is the abbr. DRGM (registered design, see MISCELLANEOUS / Terminology).	Technical Data - Diameter: 41 mm - Depth: 12 mm - Weight: 32 g The needle is locked by turning an excenter attached to the loop fitting. The needle axis is fitted on a cross bearing the cardinal points. May be an earlier version of the BUSCH model no. 3362 (see above) which had the same locking device. Back to ALPHABETICAL SEARCH (Pocket compasses)
		French compass with glass rear face, early 20th c. Technical Data - Diameter: 48 mm - Depth: 12 mm - Weight: 35 g
		Compass with glass rear face. It was carried in a leather pouch with snap lock and a large round window. The pouch is probably older than this post WWII compass. Early 20th c. Technical Data - Diameter: 45 mm - Depth: 12 mm - Weight: 40 gr Serial no.: 56 (punched on the side)
		Technical data - Diameter: 45 mm - Thickness: 10 mm - Weight: 14 gr - Convex glass on both sides - Marking: JAPAN

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- H -

HOULLIOT

PROFILE - Former French company (more information HERE). Houlliot exported worlwide (see LUFFT, model 2745).
See also Houlliot's Nautical and Survey compasses, Desombre. Also worth a visit, the equinoctial compasses (with sundial).

A part of Houlliot's production c. 1900:	(Pictures by courtesy of Michel Collignon - click on the pictures for enlarged views)
	The North mark is the hook-shaped part of a ship's anchor (Click on the pictures for enlarged views)	Technical Data - Diameter: 45 mm - Depth: 17 mm - Weight: 67 g This hunter type compass is the smallest version of a series of nautical compasses (see this category). The card division (four 90 degrees quadrants) was no longer in use when this item was manufactured (S-L catalogue 1932).
Compass with paper dial and quandrants dial (diam.: ... mm)	Compass with a luminous letter N painted on the magnet needle	Double hunter with transparent case Click to see different configurations (Pictures Ted Brink)
Compass with N & S letter shaped needle (compare with BILAND and NARDIN)	Box compass (see top row, centre - diam. 80 mm)	Box compass
Marching compass Arrow made of luminous paper glued under the crystal (early 20th C).	Marching compass (compare to a model displayed in article MORIN)	Marching compass called boussole directrice Export version for Russia (note the needle's C-shaped north end) (see detail description in MORIN)

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HUGHES

PROFILE - British manufacturer. The firm was incorporated as Henry Hughes & Sons Ltd in 1903 and opened a production facility in Forest Gate (read the full story in Wikipedia "Kelvin Hughes / The Hughes connection").
Hughes also produced various marching and wrist compasses based on Creagh-Osborne's patent (see this name in these categories).

Picture courtesy D. Beving
Click on the picture for an enlarged view

Technical Data
- Diameter: mm
- Depth: mm
- Singer design on mother of pearl
- Cardinals in red paint on crystal (compare with Fr. Barker's catalogue pictures of the models Pathfinder and Prospecting)

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- I -

ISZARD-WARREN

PROFILE - US manufacturer, created in 1908 by two former employees of the instruments maker James W. QUEEN & Co. called Charles. F. Iszard and J. Henry Warren (surveying, engineering and scientific instruments). In 1913 it became the Warren-Knight Instrument Co. It was first located in Philadelphia 136 North 12th Street and moved to their current premises in 1963 (source: www.warrenind.com).
See also Survey & Artillery Compasses (Warren-Knight).

The company's logo on a 1908 catalogue

(Click on the pictures for enlarged views)

Technical Data
- Diameter: 45 mm
- Depth: 15 mm
- Hunter case, bar needle with counterweight
- Production year: before 1913
Engraved inside the lid is the logo of Iszard-Warren's brand DU-NORTH compass

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- J -

Japan

Description: go to Religion/Chinese Tradition.
See also DOXA, compasses with transparent GLASS bottom.

- K -

KEUFFEL & ESSER

PROFILE - US manufacturer, New York (for more information click HERE)
See also category Survey & Artillery Compasses.

Open face, black card
(Picture by courtesy of puttyface6)

Hunter case, bar needle

Technical Data
- Diameter: 45 mm
- Depth: 15 mm
- Weight: 49 gr
- Radium paint markings

(Click on the pictures for enlarged views)

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KREIS

PROFILE - Swiss clock manufacturers who built from the middle of the 19th c. on compasses into pocket watches and indicated the name of the resellors (jewellers). Here is a beautiful one made for "F. W. KREIS" jeweller in Berlin. The address "Berlin, W." doesn't refer to the partition of Berlin into sectors after WW II but to the old city district West situated South of the prestigious Allee Unter den Linden.
F. W. Kreis imported also watches which were built into the cockpits of the first reconnaissance and combat aircraft during WW I (see the Website of Konrad Knirim about old military watches)

Design: compare with the Swiss made WRIST-TOP compass (see this category)

Technical Data
- Diameter: 40 mm
- Depth: 10 mm
- Weight: 30 g

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KRÖPLIN - Armeekompass

PROFILE - KRÖPLIN was founded a first time in 1883 by Heinrich Carl KRÖPLIN (02.05.1859 - 16.09.1945) in Bützow, (Northern Germany, near Rostock) in the former Grand Duchy of Mecklenburg-Schwerin. H. C. Kröplin had learnt clock manufacturing in Switzerland and France and manufactured measuring instruments, (spherometres for the optics industry, barometres etc.) in his own small factory. His heirs (son and son-in-law) were dispossessed of their property after the war in 1948 under the communist East-German government and the company was deleted from the commercial register. The family could flee to the West and re-founded KRÖPLIN in 1950 with new partners in Schlüchtern (Hesse, West-Germany). CEO (2009): Claus Werckmeister (Ing.).

(Click on pictures for enlarged view)

Technical Data
- Diameter: 60 mm
- Depth: 20 mm
- Weight: 120 g
Transit lock: excenter in the fitting of the ring

The removable card and the course pointer

The complete compass

This exhibit is a loan of the company H. C. KRÖPLIN GmbH.

PATENT
(click on picture for page 3, fig.)

(English issue also available, go to the SHOP to order)

The objective of the patent which H. C. Kröplin applied for in 1925 was to make it possible to set a marching course on a compass without having to orientate a map on a table or even on a vertical wall map and to transfer this information into the compass. He designed for this purpose a card with a (red) pointer that could be taken out of the compass capsule. The exhibit above was only a demonstration prototype (the words Armeekompass and other patent information are superfluous in a military equipment). The cardinal points W and O (for German Ost = east) are indicated for information. The removable card is contemporary and was designed and realised on the base of the KRÖPLIN ORION compass' card (see in category MARCHING COMPASSES).

Below: A series model with two covers. The top one protects the compass crystal, the rear one gives wa to the insert disk.

Front view, insert in wrong place, N should be aligned on zero!

Marking on top cover:
PATENT KRÖPLIN

Click on images for enlarged views

Technical Data
- Dia.: 55mm
- Overall length: 86 mm
- Thickness: 18 mm
- Weight: 125 g
- Transit lock: lever actuated when closing the top cover
- Adaption of magnetic declination via an adjustable device on rear face (2 screws, s. pic. at left)