The Civil War provided impetus for growth in watch sales, especially for the American Watch Co. Under Robbins leadership the company gradually added less expensive 11-jewel and 7-jewel grade watches to their line.

merged to form the American Watch Company. By the end of 1857 the company was producing movements at the rate of 365 per month. It was an 18-size, 15-jewel watch which wound with a key on the back side of the watch, and set with a key from the front. grade was the first pocket watch produced, it was essentially the same movement as was produced by the Boston Watch Company. Aaron Dennison remained in Waltham as the superintendent of the mechanical department. (Most of the remaining Boston Watch Company material and watches in progress, along with some of the watch making machinery were acquired by E. As majority owner, Robbins reorganized the company as Appleton, Tracy & Co. Appleton, New York watch wholesalers, along with Tracy and Baker, watch case manufactures in Philadelphia, purchased The Boston Watch Company factory and part of the other assets at the auction. The Boston Watch Company was sold at auction in April 1857. Sales dropped, debts climbed and bankruptcy became inevitable.

The company produced gilded full plate pocket watches ranging from 7 to 15 jewels which found acceptance in the industry, the first pocket watch produced in America of standard interchangeable parts, fostering growth until the country began experiencing a recession in 1856. to Boston Watch Company in September 1853, and a new factory in Waltham, Massachusetts was opened in October 1854. In the spring of 1853 the first Dennison, Howard, & Davis watches were offered for sale to the public. Based upon the experience of earlier failed trials, Howard and Dennison eventually perfected and patented their precision watch making machines and create the American System of Watch Manufacturing. In 1851 they moved to a new factory across the street from Howard's clock factory. They initially outfitted space for design and manufacturing in Howard's clock factory in Roxbury, Massachusetts, a community neighboring Boston. In 1849 Aaron Lufkin Dennison, Edward Howard and David Davis formed a company with a plan to use machinery to manufacture watch movement parts so precisely that they would become fully interchangeable.

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