Cabot Watch Company - A steel UKSF Mark I 'SBS- SP' military issue wristwatch head

circa 1993, the signed black dial, 32mm diameter, with Tritium indicator, luminous batons, narrow minute marks and luminous sword shaped hands, centre sweep and day/date window at 3 o'clock, 7 jewel ETA quartz movement calibre 955.122 under a protective metal cover with screw down crown, matte black non-reflective case, 41mm diameter (45mm including crown), fixed wire lug bars, 60 click unidirectional rotating division 60 bezel with thin hash marks and small lume pearl, verso screw down, engraved 0555/6645-99 7995443, pheon mark, SP, presented without strap

For decades, major Swiss watch brands, such as Rolex and Omega, had produced special versions of their diving watches for military use. However, by 1980 these brands had become legends and the budget conscious British Ministry of Defence (MOD) were forced to look for a less expensive alternative.

The London based Cabot Watch Company was a military-only supplier which had already been providing the British military with field watches since 1972. They were approached by the MOD with a request to produce military specification diving watches similar to the Omega Seamaster 300, a watch they had purchased in previous years. Officially listed as the UKSF watch and first produced in 1987, this CWC example was nicknamed ‘SBS’ as it was originally designed to the specifications of the Special Boat Service, the British Royal Navy’s elite Special Forces unit. It has been suggested that special forces operatives wanted a non-reflective black metal finish for night time operations - possibly inspired by the Royal Marines based in Hong Kong who had their issued steel Royal Navy dive watches black-coated locally - and that the day-date function was because they often spent considerable amounts of time on missions and found it helpful to keep track of the days. The original versions are very rare. Only 100 were manufactured in the first batch, and only a handful are still known to survive. More batches were manufactured throughout the 1990s, including this example, and were issued to the SBS, SAS boat crews and other specialist units.

In 2000, the decision was made to phase out the RN dive watch and make the SBS the standard dive watch for the British military, and several hundred were ordered in 2001 and 2005, including a large batch for the Royal Engineers.

Only CWC produced the black day-date dive watch for the British military. For this reason, as well as for its link to British Special Forces, issued versions of this watch are highly sought-after by collectors.

The NATO numbers engraved to the back of this example relate to:

0555 - produced between 1993 – 2001 (approximately 750 units produced during this period)

6645 - NATO stores code for military watch

99 - UK issue

7995443 - Steel quartz SBS day/date dive watch

pheon or broad arrow mark indicates government issue

SP - This replaces the usual date reference. There is some speculation about the letters, but it is generally accepted to refer to special order runs from the 1990s with SP standing for Special Project, Special Procurement or Special Purchase. The theory is that they were limited quantity customised batches made up to order for small specialist units within the British military. There is much speculation about the identity of these individual units, but regrettably no firm evidence.

(With grateful thanks to Jonathan Hughes - CWC addict - for his assistance in the cataloguing of this lot)