Tudor

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This military-issued Tudor is listed for $28,550 by HQ Milton.

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An MN77 on ledger book. (Source: Bernhard Bulang - Bulang & Sons)

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It is now generally accepted that the MN watches were ordered from Geneva in batches that are identifiable across a number of years. The first batch of South African MilSubs date to 1974 and fall within one of the earliest batches of French MN 7016s – the most coveted black “MN 74”. The second batch was issued later in the 1970s and only two examples are known to still exist from that group, leading us to conclude that there were fewer ordered – there is a strong belief that that these watches were probably sourced through the French Marine Nationale, by the South African Navy

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Big Crown Ref. 7924 Argentinian Navy Tudor “Submariner,” 200m/660ft, Rotor Self-Winding, Ref. 7924, case made by Rolex, Geneva. Made in 1958. Fine center seconds, self-winding, water resistant to 200 m., stainless steel diver's wristwatch. (Source: antiquorum.com)

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Jamaican Defence Force
One of the rarest and most unusual Tudor MilSubs I have encountered was issued to the Jamaican Defence Force. The Jamaican Defence Force (JDF) was formed in August 1963 as Jamaica’s maritime law enforcement body. The JDF’s original role was search and rescue and drugs policing. In the 1980s a diving division was introduced whose members were trained by the US Navy. The roles and missions of the diving department (then and now) are numerous. In addition to its previous duties, the diving unit carries out underwater inspection of drains, gutters and oil pipelines, ships’ hull searches (for narcotics and other smuggled goods) and pier-side dives searching for explosives, as requested by visiting foreign warships.

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Caseback of an ARA issued Tudor MilSub ref. 7924. (Source: Ross Povey)

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revolution

Israeli Defence Force
The Israeli Navy has an elite naval commando unit called Shayetet 13 (or S13) that has a reputation as one of the world’s finest and most secretive special-forces units. It has been deployed in all of Israel’s wars and is made up of specialist sea-to-land combat troops.  A number of Tudor Submariners were issued to S13 members in the mid-1960s, all of which had the letter “M” and three numbers.

I am aware of a number of examples that were bought directly from ex-service personnel, and all these watches feature what collectors have dubbed a “drunken M”, where the “M” in the engraving is slanted as though it is in italics. There are a number of bad fakes with very poor quality engravings that are stylistically nothing like the authentic examples. Additionally, the watches were originally painted black and original examples still have traces of the black in unexposed areas of the watch.

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revolution

If you ask any seasoned Rolex or Tudor collector which area of this crazy hobby is the most secretive and shrouded in mystery, they will inevitably reply with the murky world of military watches and in particular Submariners; know as MilSubs. The four most knowledgeable and influential Rolex MilSub collectors in the world are good personal friends of mine and I have literally seen dozens of their watches over the years… and I still am a little baffled by the details. I am, however, very familiar with Tudor MilSubs, which are in many ways a broader subject than their Rolex cousins as they were much more widely issued to a range of military forces around the world.

So where do we start with the Tudor MilSubs? Well, the most important place is the caseback — that’s the key to the Tudors. The British MOD asked Rolex to produce watches that met very detailed specifications and Rolex responded with the military-only versions of Submariner refs. 5513, 5517 and the double reference 5513/17. These watches had to have a specified hand shape (for visibility), 60-minute bezel markers (for accuracy), fixed lug bars (for security) and a circled T on the dial to denote the use of tritium lume on the hands and hour markers.

The casebacks were also fully engraved, but from the front the watches were clearly different to a civilian Rolex Submariner 5513. The military departments that decided to issue their troops Tudor Submariners were a lot less specific in their requirements and were happy to issue their troops standard Tudor Submariners, but they tended to engrave the casebacks to keep track or show ownership of the watches. And so the fun begins…

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A Tudor Oyster Submariners Marine Nationale from 1972. (Source: antiquorum.com)

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 A Tudor Submariner Reference 7928 Issued To And Used By A U.S. Navy SEAL In Vietnam

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[Giuseppe Busso]

Θεόδωρος Μαυρόμπεης ΓΜΤ.