Josef Ungar was a Viennese goldsmith and jeweller from Galicia. In 1912 he opened a jeweller's shop and workshop at Trattnerhof 1 in Vienna's 1st district. He was a member of the board of the Genossenschaft und Meistervereinigung für Juweliere, Gold- und Silberschmiede (Cooperative and Masters' Association for Jewellers, Goldsmiths and Silversmiths). After the annexation in March 1938 an unnamed, probably self-appointed temporary administrator took over the jewellery business. Like all those defined by the Nazis as Jews whose assets exceeded 5,000 Reichsmarks, Ungar had to submit an asset declaration by 30 June 1938 to the Vermögensverkehrsstelle (Property Transaction Office), which valued the assets at 67,097.10 Reichsmarks. As part of the liquidation process, Franz Szirba, a newly appointed temporary administrator, prepared the transfer of the remaining stocks to the Einkaufs- und Treuhandgenossenschaft für die Uhren- und Juwelenbranche. In June 1938 he had given the Uhrenmuseum der Stadt Wien two pocket watches and a repeater without a case belonging to Ungar. In 1939, the Abwicklungsstelle für die Liquidation und Arisierung des Uhren- und Juwelenfaches (department for the liquidation and Aryanization of the clock and jewellery sector) headed by Andreas Käs liquidated Ungar's company. Robbed of his business, Josef Ungar and his wife Gertrud fled to London in December 1938. From there they emigrated to New York, where they lived the rest of their lives.

During the systematic provenance research in the Wien Museum the two pocket watches were restituted in 2003 to the 94-year-old Gertrud Ungar, whose husband had died in 1971. The repeater could not be returned as it had been lost in 1945 at a Städtische Sammlungen depot.