Times are tough. Even though Rolex prices keep falling, it’s best not to roll out of your home with your Rollie these days if you’re a Manhattan resident. According to the NYPD, a dangerous thief is wanted in connection to three AAA best Rolex replica watches robberies.
The thefts aren’t just hold ups, police say. The suspect is said to put victims in chokeholds until they pass out and then makes off with their UK cheap Rolex fake watches. On Sunday July 14, in the wee hours of the morning around 2:40 a.m., a 27-year-old sporting $14,000 Rolex copy watches for sale was targeted on 42 Morton Street in the West Village. The thief followed suit on Friday, August 9 around 1:00 a.m., when he stole another $14,000 Rolex off of a 26-year-old man riding the subway on the No. 1 train at the 14th Street train stop. The suspect’s perfect replica Rolex watches tear took off from his first reported theft, which was a $300 Orient watch stolen from a 29-year-old at 147 Christopher Street. Given the watch brand’s Rolex-influenced design, it’s possible the thief thought he was making away with another timepiece from the Crown.
The news follows other reports of Rollie thefts in the Big Apple from earlier this summer when outdoor diners were targeted for their wrist candy—also in the West Village—at restaurants like Carbone and Marlow & Sons. In those robberies, two suspects were working together and it wasn’t just high quality Rolex super clone watches UK they were after—they also made off with other coveted high-end brands like Audemars Piguet and, in one case, a $100,000 Patek Philippe stolen at gunpoint.
The moral of the story? Keep your Swiss movements fake Rolex watches at home for now, and definitely don’t wear it out for a night of partying on the mean streets of Manhattan…particularly, the West Village/Union Square neighborhoods, where the robberies appear to keep happening.
Back in April, the Swiss movements replica Rolex Deepsea 136668LB watches was one of the most talked about watches of Watches & Wonders. The Deepsea has always been Rolex’s biggest and boldest dive watch (until the 50mm wide Deepsea Challenge 126067 came along that is, but we’ll ignore that for now). It takes the iconic design codes of the Submariner and beefs it up to 3,900m of water resistance. So why all the buzz then? Well, because contrary to before, Rolex made it out of solid 18k yellow gold and essentially created a proper diving weight for the wrist! After some months to reflect, I thought it was time to try and wrap my head around this 320-gram behemoth of Rolex fake watches for sale.
There are 1:1 UK Rolex copy watches that immediately make sense when you see them, and there are watches that make no sense at all but you love them anyway. And then there’s the heads-nor-tails category of watches that can divide a room full of watch enthusiasts faster than the date position on a dial. Some love it, some hate it, and here I am, trying to find logic in it all. The perfect replica Rolex Deepsea 136668LB watches is that kind of a watch. Opinions were pretty much unanimous upon release, and judging the watch on paper, I felt the same. The question ‘But, why?’ was on everyone’s mind.
At 44mm wide the Deepsea is already a large watch. Add to that a height of 17.7mm and it starts to become gargantuan. Then to make it out of full yellow gold and have it tipping the scales at a monstrous 320 grams and wearing this becomes a genuine exercise! Next thing you know, you’ll have a disproportional left arm like Rafael Nadal! I am well aware of the fact you need some beef to dive to 3,900 meters of depth, at which point the hydrostatic pressure is close to 380atm (for reference, at sea level it’s 1atm). No man will survive that outside of a proper diving vessel like the Deepsea Challenger (hey, what’s in a name!). And in all honesty, 99% of all dive Rolex fake watches for sale will never see depths beyond, oh let’s say a swimming pool or a spontaneous snorkelling adventure in the ocean during summer holidays.
Rolex, and many other brands and people for that matter, will state there’s a definite need for a watch to be this big to withstand such pressures, and they’re somewhat right in that, of course. At first glance though, it sounds like something extremely big and heavy, and almost uncomfortable to wear. Three hundred and twenty grams is a lot of weight for a watch. To compare, an Oystersteel Rolex Submariner weighs around 160 grams, depending on the length of the bracelet. High quality Rolex Sea-Dweller replica watches of the same material weighs little more than that.
Then there’s the contradiction of a proper tool watch like the Deepsea is intended to be, and the luxurious allure of 18k yellow gold. That doesn’t make any sense, now does it? Well mostly no, but there’s an argument to be made about weight and the feeling of luxury. To me, there’s an undefined link between the two. Bigger Rolex super clone watches wholesale need to have some sort of weight to them in order to ‘work’ for me. I need to feel that I have something substantial on my wrist. That’s part of the reason I have only 1 titanium watch, and it’s not a tool watch. But steel does the trick perfectly fine, and I feel no need for the added weight of gold. So what’s left? Flexing on the boulevard of a Mediterranean hot spot, or on the high streets of the world’s leading cities? Sure, but you would run the risk of getting robbed or worse…
In all honesty, upon first handling the Swiss made Rolex copy watches it became apparent to me that it made no sense whatsoever. For all the reasons I explained above, it simply shouldn’t work. And yet, it does…. in a weird way. A couple of weeks ago I had a bit more time with it in comparison to the mad dash that’s Watches & Wonders. And trying it on, it started to grow on me. In hand, it does indeed feel very heavy and you can’t ignore the sheer size. But on the wrist, it becomes quite balanced, both in size and weight. Granted, it helps that I have above-average-sized wrists at 19cm in circumference, but they’re not mammoth-sized either. Then there’s the weight, which the bracelet helps to distribute quite evenly, much to my surprise. It’s not overly top-heavy, nor is it uncomfortable to the point you simply can’t wear it. Far from it in fact, the fit and finish of the gold case and bracelet, the titanium caseback, and the Glidelock extension system are typical Rolex. Or in other words; extremely good!
To end this with an answer to the question I started with, the luxury UK fake Rolex Deepsea 13668LB watches makes some sense, but not a whole lot. It’s a very good watch overall, as you would expect from the people at Rolex. It’s just a tad too much for most people, myself included. Despite the fact I was positively surprised when I had more than 2 minutes with it, it’s still a statement piece for the right, but also for a couple of wrong reasons. No serious diver will take this down on a dive as a backup instrument to his diving computer. Vice versa, I expect no one who buys this to need that 3,900m water resistance in their life, ever. So in the very end, what’s left is the simple fact it’s just something to flex. A very big and very heavy yellow-gold flex…
World War II wreaked havoc around the globe. Many millions died, and at times, it must have felt like the end of the world as nations committed everything to defeating their enemies. Swiss made Rolex replica watches also lent a hand in a small way by providing timepieces to prisoners of war (POWs).
As a graduate history student, I have always had a deep interest in this period. And as a journalist who, in my day job, has worked in conflict zones, something about WWII as a subject has always drawn me in. I think it’s because I hope that by studying that period, we can all take stock of the true human cost of conflict.
Rolex and WWII
This isn’t the first story about Rolex and WWII that I’ve written on Fratello. I’ve looked at how an Australian soldier with the Rats of Tobruk fought against the Axis in North Africa with a Rolex strapped to his wrist. A local collector here in Australia later found this 1:1 UK Rolex fake watches and even managed to track down images of the soldier (and watch) in action.
I wrote another story about the role that Rolex and early Tudor watches played on the wrists of many Royal Canadian Navy officers during the Battle of the Atlantic. This included tracking down some incredible historical images. But what follows is a story about Rolex and POWs in particular.
Rolex and POW watches
For soldiers who faced internment in a prisoner-of-war camp during WWII, things must have seemed particularly grim. In a stroke of marketing genius, however, Hans Wilsdorf of Rolex decided to provide Allied POWs with best replica Rolex watches from his company.
A grim conflict
Why not let prisoners purchase new perfect Rolex copy watches on the proviso that they could pay for them postwar upon their release? The notion served multiple purposes. Not only did it act as a morale boost for the POWs, but it was also a good way to raise Rolex’s profile.
In this wonderful article by Rolex Magazine, we can see the personal story of one such POW, Clive James Nutting. For those interested in the story of one Allied POW soldier and his high quality Rolex fake watches, please read it. And, as Watches of Espionage noted, this move could not have come at a more appropriate time. The scale of human misery in WWII made every human conflict up to that point simply pale in comparison.
Neutral Switzerland provides an opportunity for Rolex
Now, the logistics for Rolex to deliver watches to Allied POWs in Germany were possible because of Switzerland’s neutrality in the conflict. As I have reported here on Fratello before, though, even if Switzerland was neutral, it still faced accidental bombing by Allied air forces as well as the constant threat of a German invasion. In fact, Nazi Germany had drawn up plans to invade Switzerland but never carried them out.
Packages could be sent from Switzerland to camps inside Germany. Even so, Wilsdorf was taking a risk because there was no way to guarantee that the POWs could pay him back at the end of the war. No one knew who would win WWII (except perhaps in the very late stages of the conflict) or even when it would end. Wilsdorf must have realized there was a chance he would have to write every single Swiss made Rolex replica watches off.
Thousands of Rolex watches delivered to POWs
Interestingly enough, according to sources like Rolex Magazine, British POW officers ordered as many as 3,000 top fake Rolex watches. Wilsdorf’s decision to let the Allied soldiers sort out payment after the war implies that he believed that the Axis (Nazi Germany, Fascist Italy, and Imperial Japan) would lose, and this certainly would have raised morale among the Allied POWs when receiving their watches. Imagine the feeling of getting a brand-new Rolex watch while stuck in an internment camp. It must have felt wonderful.
It also turns out that some of those Allied POWs who took part in what became immortalized as The Great Escape were wearing luxury super clone Rolex POW watches. This escape consisted of 76 Allied airmen from Stalag Luft III Nazi Luftwaffe Prisoner of War camp in March 1944. It has since become one of history’s most famous prison breaks and was the subject of the 1963 film The Great Escape.
Rolex watches and The Great Escape
Stalag Luft III was 100 miles southeast of Berlin. The historical escape is incredible when you consider the lengths to which prison security went to keep prisoners inside. These included raising prisoners’ huts about two feet off the ground to prevent tunneling from within and burying microphones 8–10 feet underground along the perimeter fencing to pick up any sounds of digging. The Germans had purposely built the camp on top of a sand base that made tunneling dangerous and unstable. It also made it harder for prisoners to conceal when they were digging.
According to historical accounts and modern estimations, POWs must have excavated more than 100 tons of sand to prepare for their escape. They hid it (just like in a scene in the 1963 movie) by raking the sand into the prison gardens.
The moment to escape comes
The escape was orchestrated by Roger Bushell, a Royal Air Force pilot who had been shot down over France while assisting with the Allied evacuation of Dunkirk. Bushell and as many as 600 fellow prisoners started building three tunnels (with the code names Harry, Dick, and Tom) which would stretch to about 300 feet, which was the distance to forest cover outside the camp fenceline. The penalty for being found outside the camp could be death, so they were all taking huge risks. However, the POWs reasoned that if they could reach the forest, they might just stand a chance. To avoid the microphones, they dug to a depth of around 30 feet. They used a trap door concealed beneath a stove which was always kept lit to discourage their guards from looking underneath.
According to historical records, “Prisoners stripped some 4,000 wooden bed boards to build ladders and shore up the sandy walls of the two-foot-wide tunnels to prevent their collapse. They stuffed 1,700 blankets against the walls to muffle sounds. They converted more than 1,400 powdered milk tin cans provided by the Red Cross into digging tools and lamps in which wicks fashioned from pajama cords were burned in mutton fat skimmed off the greasy soup they were served.”
The hunt for the escapees
After the 76 prisoners escaped, the manhunt was enormous. Within two weeks, the Germans had recaptured 73 of them. Three ended up successfully fleeing. Two were Norwegians who stowed away on a Swedish freighter, and one was a Dutchman who made it to Gibraltar. Adolf Hitler personally ordered the execution of 50 of the escapees.
Among those who planned to escape was RAF Corporal Clive James Nutting. According to this article by Rolex Magazine, Nutting’s stainless steel wholesale replica Rolex Oyster Chronograph ref. 3525 watches was delivered to the camp on August 4th, 1943. The construction of the tunnels had already been underway for at least five months by this stage. The Rolex Magazine story notes that Nutting wrote to Rolex seeking his final invoice in 1948.
Concluding thoughts
Nutting was unable to use the tunnel before it was discovered, a sequence of events that most likely saved his life. He ended up moving to my home country of Australia with his family in the early 1970s. His watch and associated correspondence with Hans Wilsdorf were sold at auction by Antiquorum for £66,000 in 2007. Nutting went on to work as a consultant for the 1950 film The Wooden Horse and, over a decade later, The Great Escape. Other POW Rolex copy watches for sale have also come up for auction in the past.
