'A year of my life that has gone' : Man fighting cancer devastated after watch collection is stolen

A man undergoing cancer treatment says he may never be able to return to the hobby that was taking his mind off the illness after a burglary.

The 64-year-old bought rare watches from Russia and other countries in the region and spent hours mending them — a skill he had taught himself.

However, all 60 vintage watches were stolen in the burglary at his Edward Avenue home in Newark.

The man, who does not want to be identified, said: “I invested so much of myself in my hobby and everything is gone. I don’t feel I can return to it.

“I’m about to start (cancer) treatment again and I have no idea what I will have, if anything, to be my distraction or focus from now.”

The man was asleep upstairs when he was alerted to the burglary in the early hours of Monday, December 11 by a neighbour who saw footprints in frost. The victim’s back door was open.

All of the drawers and cupboards in downstairs rooms had been opened and, as well as the 60 rare watches, a Tag Heuer watch given to the man by his late mother 30 years ago was missing together with watch movements and spare parts.

“I was shaken when I realised what had happened,” the man said.

“I have retired from work as a guitar maker and am having cancer treatment on my esophagus.

“As if that was not enough, this has knocked me back.

“I wanted to find something absorbing and compelling — a hobby that was challenging — to take my mind off things.

“Because of my work I have an eye for detail.

“I thought about vintage watches and that it would be a challenge to repair them.

“Russian watches from the Soviet Union era are so unusual.

“I had never tried to repair a watch before so I taught myself how.”

'A year of my life that has gone'

The man spent many hours sourcing and buying the watches on eBay and said he was excited by each new arrival from countries such as Russia, Uzbekistan and Tajikistan.

He bought a microscope to help him repair and replace intricate parts and mechanisms.

“I wanted to get them all finished by the end of this year and I had just done that,” he said: “It is a year of my life that has gone.

“I don’t think whoever did it realised what they were looking at as the watches are not very valuable.

“It is more about the time and the effort I have put in rather than their intrinsic value, although I did think I could add some value and make a little bit of money towards my retirement.

“Each one (I completed) was a boost. It was a nice little collection.

“Surprisingly, given where they came from, a lot of the watches were quite colourful and they will be easily recognisable because they all have Cyrillic writing on them.”

The man said being burgled two weeks before Christmas was a low blow.

“There is a story behind every front door,” he said.

“Someone doing something like this has no idea what a person (their victim) has been through or how it would affect them.

“Hopefully this will make someone think twice about committing burglary in the future.”

In addition to the watches, Hindu altar jewellery, a laptop and a Samsung Galaxy phone were stolen.

Anyone with information is asked to ring Nottinghamshire Police on 101.