1940s Cyma Military Watch

In the 1940s CYMA was one of the ‘Dirty Dozen’, which was a selection of 12 watch brands worn by WWII British soldiers. The 'Dirty Dozen' brands were commissioned by the British Ministry of Defense, which needed as many watches as possible produced for the British soldiers. Manufacturing capacity at the time allowed for roughly 145,000 watches to be produced.

The arrow seen on the dial, which is regularly seen on military watches, marks the watch as "crown property"; the British monarch's sovereign public estate, which was considered neither government property nor part of the monarch's private estate.  Although manufactured by a dozen companies (known as the "Dirty Dozen" by military watch collectors), CYMA's models are especially sought-after, as CYMA utilized high-quality steel for their version of the MOD spec watch, despite the steel shortage caused by the war efforts of the time. The other brands had to make their watch cases from much more inferior metals, meaning many of the watches offered by the other brands of the "dirty dozen" haven't held up in the following decades.