Air guns of this style were used primarily for indoor target shooting. "Wind guns" had several advantages over conventional firearms including that they were quieter, smokeless, quicker to reload, and they also required less cleaning since they did not require corrosive black powder. This exact gallery air gun is photographed on page 99 of "Blue Book of Airguns, Thirteenth Edition" and described on page 100 where it is called a "New England" type air gun, as produced for gallery target shooting sometime during the Civil War era by an American gunsmith. It has no maker markings and chambered in .22 caliber/5.5 mm with a smooth bore, a blade front sight, and is mounted with a walnut stock with pewter end cap, German silver patchbox and accent on the buttstock, brass trigger guard and brass buttplate. Absent rear sight with two empty mounting holes on top. It functions through the use of a right side mounted lever that is pulled back for cocking in order to fill the cylinder reservoir, and upon pulling the trigger the spring loaded piston releases. The barrel twists to a loose position for loading at the breech. Circular brass collection tag marked "R.D. BEEMAN/PRIVATE/COLLECTION/081" hanging from the trigger guard. Provenance: The Dr. Robert D. Beeman Collection