George Jones was among the first London concertina makers, supplying affordable instruments from the 1850s. No factory books survive, and the surviving museum attributions are inconsistent — every point here is marked low confidence on purpose. Treat Jones dating as “roughly this era”, never as a firm year.
The record makes room for uncertainty when a precise year is unavailable.
Factory and production era appear alongside the date when supported by a source.
See the source behind a match and what still needs to be confirmed.
The archive currently covers 1 series and 16 dating ranges from 1850 to 1899, compiled from published maker records and reference charts. Coverage grows as new tables are verified.
The exact spot varies by era and instrument type — the serial number guide walks through the common locations.
Recheck the characters exactly as marked, including any letters and leading zeros. Letter-prefixed numbers often belong to student or non-domestic lines that cannot be dated from the number. Some production periods may simply not be covered yet.