Huguenot Huguenot is a descriptor that refers to a French Protestant of the 16th to 17th centuries. Largely Calvinists, the Huguenots suffered severe persecution at the hands of the Catholic majority during this period, particularly in France. Some 500,000 Huguenots fled the country illegally, settling in Holland, Germany and England. Famous Huguenot clockmakers include the early watchmakers James Vautrollier, Isaac Pluvier and David Boquet, all active during the 1600s in London. Protestants from the Low Countries known as Walloons, such as Nicholas Vallin and his father John Vallin, were also part of the Huguenot diaspora that sought refuge from the terrifying wave of anti-Protestant violence and persecution that erupted across Europe in the wake of the St Bartholomew’s Day Massacre. The Vallins were an important clockmaking family who settled in London during the late 1500s. Clockmakers David Ramsay, Ahasuerus Fromanteel and Edward East all employed Huguenot workers in their workshops, much to the irritation of the Worshipful Company of Clockmakers. The French-born Dutch architect, decorative designer and engraver Daniel Marot, who was one of King William III’s royal architects, was another famous Huguenot artisan who was highly influential during the golden age of British clockmaking. You can read about the St Bartholomew Day’s Massacre and the Huguenot rebellions, as well as how skilled Huguenot artisans contributed to London’s status as the premier centre for clockmaking in Europe during the 17th and 18th centuries, in the Clocktime article Huguenot makers and their contribution to London Clockmaking.
