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Rare Cochran Second Type "Many Chambered" Horizontal Turret Rifle #157 Fur Trade Period .38 caliber. 28.625" octagonal barrel with full-length underlug. SN: 157. Browned finish, iron, German silver and brass furniture, walnut buttstock. Underhammer percussion rifle with manually rotated nine chambered horizontal turret "cylinder". Hinged topstrap is marked in five lines near the breech COCHRAN / MANY / CHAMBERED / NONRECOIL / RIFLE and in three lines towards the rear, C.B. ALLEN / SPRINGFIELD / MASS. The matching serial number 157 is found on the left side of the barrel, left side of the frame, under the turret, under the topstrap and on the bottom of the cylinder stop latch. An old sight base with no leaf is present in the rear sight dovetail and the front sight dovetail is empty. A wing shaped nut at the rear of the action can be turned 90-degrees to allow the topstrap to be raised upwards on a hinged at the front of the action to remove the turret for loading. A small spring loaded release lever on the upper rear of the topstrap functions as a cylinder stop and allows the turret to be rotated and locked into the indexed position for firing. The graceful under hammer serves as the triggerguard for the rifle. The gun is mounted with a German silver buttplate and rectangular wrist escutcheon, and with a brass reinforcing plate at the top rear of the action where the hinged topstrap engages the rotating latch. All other furniture is of iron. Two iron ramrod pipes secure an old wooden rod for clearing and cleaning. A solid and scarce example of a Cochran Turret Rifle from the late 1830s, with an estimated overall production of only about 200 total guns. John W Cochran of New York received two US Patents related to the design of his "Many Chambered Rifle". The initial design concept was granted US Patent #188 on April 29, 1837, while the improvement concept that patented the hinged topstrap was granted US Patent #183 on the same day. It is estimated that roughly 30 of the "First Type" turret rifles were produced with the more complex topstrap before the new "Second Type" hinged topstrap was adopted. Flayderman's lists the serial number range of the "Second Type" Cochran Rifles as nominally 30 to 155, with this gun as #157 potentially being one of the very last of the "Second Type" Cochran Rifles to be produced before the "Third Type" rifles were introduced with a smaller 7-chambered turret and a trigger that was not surrounded by the hammer. The estimated production range for these "Third Type" rifles is from about #155 to #200. As Cochran did not have production capabilities, the guns were produced by C.B. Allen of Springfield, MA. Allen worked from roughly 1836-1841 (Sellers) and is most noted for his production of Elgin-patent "Cutlass Pistols" and Cochran's Turret Rifles. This lot is located in Cincinnati.