Close-up of the serial number reported by officials at Rolex Service Center for Ian Fleming's 1016 Explorer: Proof that a serial number reference doesn't always absolutely identify a wristwatch
“It should.”
“Maybe.”
“I dunno. Does it?”
As we continue our investigation of conflicting claims of ownership regarding the actual pre-Daytona Rolex 6238 Chronograph watch worn by actor George Lazenby as James Bond in the movie, On Her Majesty’s Secret Service (1969), it’s been suggested that an examination of the serial number (case number) be considered dispositive. I disagree.
Ironically, there’s a direct parallel to this question in Ian Fleming’s own Rolex 1016 Explorer — currently on display at the National Watch & Clock Museum in Columbia, Pennsylvania.
That watch, as researchers and collectors will recall, is the one that I identified for the first time as “the original, literary James Bond watch.” The one specified by Mr Fleming for Agent 007 in his novel, On Her Majesty’s Secret Service (1963). Those findings were published in the February 2009 issue of WatchTime.
However, I was actually doing a variety of detail fact-checking the summer prior to publication; on June 5, 2008, to be exact. That is when I had pulled an original Rolex Service Center report on the Fleming-Bond watch. That document dated months even earlier still, when the watch was being prepared for its only other public display, at the Imperial War Museum in conjunction with the Ian Fleming Centenary.
Ian Fleming’s Rolex 1016 Explorer I was identified as having “Case No. 596851,” it said.
That was what the “Estimate” said. That was what the final invoice said. As a matter of fact, in preparing for this James Bond Watches Blog article, I’ve pulled true copies of numerous official Rolex papers indicating 596851 as the serial number on the Ian Fleming watch.
Only one document says this is not the correct number.
The very first in the series, the Rolex Service Center “Acknowledgment” of receipt for examination — dated two days prior to the “Estimate,” and evidencing the exact same “Service Number” as all other documents with the 596851 case number — recorded 596351 as the serial number on Ian Fleming’s James Bond watch.
Same watch, two different serial numbers?
Not exactly. Shortly after that Rolex Explorer I was returned to the Fleming estate following Imperial War Museum display, I asked one of his surviving family members to take the watch back to the Rolex Service Center for clarification.
And, to be perfectly clear here, we’re talking about an examination of just one series of digits, in just one place on the physical wristwatch: Where it is engraved between the lugs. Moreover, a number of experts at that official Rolex facility examined those markings.
All agreed that, due to wear, it was impossible to tell for certain whether 596351 or 596851 was the correct serial number for Ian Fleming’s watch. Enough material was there, however, to say that it is definitely one of those two numbers.
In June of 2010, Bob Ridley of Watchmakers International removed the bracelet from Ian Fleming’s Rolex Explorer just prior to its display at the National Watch & Clock Museum as centerpiece to the “Bond Watches, James Bond Watches” exhibit. Mr Ridley’s assessment was the same as the folks’ at Rolex.
I, myself, personally examined that watch under high-power magnification, and I agree as well.
What this means, then, I suppose, is that someday, someone might come forward with a Rolex Explorer case number 596351 or 596851 and claim that he (or she) owns “the” Ian Fleming 1016. “Look at the clearly visible serial number!”
But, assuming someone had kept track of the actual Ian Fleming Rolex 1016 Explorer, all that new person would really have done in showing us an authentic, unaltered watch with either of the serial numbers indicated, would be to, by process of elimination, point us to the more likely actual number on the real Ian Fleming James Bond watch.
That, boys and girls, is why I’m not sanguine about putting all my eggs in one basket for matching a serial number listed in a Christie’s auction catalogue as absolute proof of ownership for the original Rolex 6238 Chronograph featured in the 1969 Eon Productions film, On Her Majesty’s Secret Service.
Thus, the investigation will continue here.
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