Description
Legendary Sturmanskie mechanical watch, 15 jewels
MADE IN USSR!
Beautiful vintage watch manufactured at the 1st Moscow Watch Factory (1MChZ)
Legendary Soviet brand trademark Sturmanskie – first watch worn in space!
This is an original Sturmanskie watch, MADE IN USSR.
The watch is mechanical and does not need batteries to operate.
This particular watch was manufactured in the 1st quarter of 1950!
Original Soviet “Sturmanskie” has mechanical lever movement and manual winding.
MANUFACTURE DATE 1st quarter of 1950
CASE SIZE Approx. 42x36mm (with crown)
TYPE Mechanical
MOVEMENT 15 jewels
FUNCTIONS Hours, Minutes, Seconds
Mechanical lever movement with manual winding
This watch has recently been serviced by a professional watchmaker and keeps good time.
Original dial with natural aged patina and spotting; the chrome-plated case shows visible wear consistent with its age.
Comes complete with a new leather cuff strap with a built-in compass included
This watch ships from 🇺🇦 Ukraine with tracking number
Modes of payment:
- PayPal
- Credit Cards (VISA, MasterCard, American Express, Discover)
- bitcoin
We guarantee the item you receive looks and works exactly as advertised — or your money back.
About the watch factory
1st Moscow Watch Factory (1.MWF, renamed to Poljot after 1964) – the biggest and oldest of Soviet watch factories.
Russian watches have a rich and interesting history dating back over 80 years with the creation of the First Moscow Watch Factory, which today manufactures Poljot watches.
A highlight of Russia’s watch history came in 1961 when cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin took the first ever flight into space with a watch from the First Moscow Watch Factory.
Sturmanskie Brand History
Sturmanskie (Штурманские — “the navigator’s”) was never a shop watch. The 1st Moscow Watch Factory built it from 1949 to a Soviet Air Force specification, and it could not be bought: it was issued to graduating navigators and pilots of the air force academies along with their commission.
The first generation ran from the third quarter of 1949 until about 1954 — a 15-jewel hand-wound movement, centre seconds hand, no shock protection, and a snap-on case back stamped with the watch’s own production date. In 1954 it was replaced by a second generation with 17 jewels, a shock-protected balance, a screw-down case back, and revised hands and crown. That is the version in service when Yuri Gagarin graduated from the Orenburg flight school in 1957, and the one Sturmanskie’s own brand history credits with the flight of 12 April 1961 — the first watch worn in space.
Because these watches were issued rather than sold, far fewer survive than of the factory’s civilian output. The early dials carry no Poljot marking at all: they read ШТУРМАНСКИЕ above the 1st Moscow Watch Factory mark, since Poljot only became a brand name in 1961.
The original navigator’s watch left production in the early 1960s. The name returned in 1976 on the Sturmanskie 3133 chronograph — 23 jewels, hand-wound, built on Valjoux 7734 tooling the Soviet Union purchased in 1974 — again supplied to air force crews rather than sold over the counter.
Sturmanskie survives today as a Russian brand, and the Gagarin-linked models remain its centrepiece — but the watches that actually flew, and the ones collectors chase, are these early 1MChZ pieces.
