One of the early American machine tool makers, the N.H. Baldwin Company was founded in 1868 and based in Laconia, New Hampshire. Like so many of the New England makers at the time, Baldwin offered a wide range of machines that included simple plain-turning and screwcutting lathes, wood-turning lathes, gear-making machines, a hand-operated metal-planing machine and a variety of scroll and circular saws. Intended for the small professional or home workshop, as no electricity supply was available at the time, many machines were treadle operated, the drive using a large flywheel driven through a link mechanism - an arrangement referred to in the United States as a "Pitman arm".
One interesting lathe manufactured by Baldwin used, for its screwcutting arrangement, a "traversing mandrel" or, as it's known today, a "sliding headstock spindle". A version of "Chase screwcutting", who invented this system is unknown, but Baldwin must have been an early adopter and so among the first to use it - and it did require high-class engineering to make it effective and accurate. Details of exactly how it was arranged on a Baldwin are not known; but as the operating principle was simple, it would have worked in the usual way by employing a set of star-shaped "master threads". The threading system was carried on a thick plate, dovetailed to the outside face of the headstock casting, with engagement and disengagement by a lever that lifted it up and down (in the illustration below, the lever can just be seen). Each master thread would have carried up to six different pitches with a set of twenty or so covering all likely requirements. As the master thread was lifted, it meshed with a matching thread carried on the outer end of the headstock spindle and, as the spindle rotated, it was driven forwards through its bearings. A stationary cutting tool, held in a normal toolpost, then generated the required thread on the workpiece as it emerged from the chuck or collet. Widely employed on ornamental turning lathes in the 1800s, by the early 1900s, it was in widespread use by Swiss companies such as Schaublin and Mikron and by German makers including Boley, Lorch, Wolf Jahn, Karger and Auerbach (the smallest model ever to incorporate it being the Wolf Jahn Model AA with a centre height of just 50 mm).
A lathe contemporary to the Baldwin, fitted with a sliding headstock spindle and also illustrated in a woodcut, was one by Lorch. Pictures that show details of typical sliding-headstock systems can be seen by scrolling down the pages for Karger Auerbach, Lorch and Hamann lathes.
The black and white woodcut illustrations reproduced below are from a makers catalogue circa 1870..

A Baldwin lathe from the 1860s with foot drive but also available with a wall or ceiling-mounted countershaft,  The leadscrew ran along the back of the bed, driven initially by  bevel gears that provided for and reverse drive to the carriage. Note the fine lining and other cosmetic decoration -  Nathan Baldwin was clearly proud of his factory's products.

A similar lathe to the one above and dated 1868. This model has the addition of an extra-fine feed to the carried by a front-mounted power shaft turned by a three-step pulley that took it power from an extension to the shaft upon which the set of bevel reversing gears was also driven. This fine example has survived compete with its optional countershaft system - one that incorporated the "fast-and-loose" system with one  fastened to its shaft but its partner free to rotate about it.  In the idle position, the belt ran over the loose pulley, a sticker arm, controlled by a long lever within reach of the operator that enabling him to flick the belt across from one to the other and so start and stop the spindle

An 1870 Baldwin lathe that was discovered, covered in dirt and congealed oil, in the Attic workshop of Charles S. Shultz (1839-1924) a bank President who lived in Montclair, NJ. The lathe was installed when new and remained in that location - and with the same family - until 2021. One of the highest quality, most complex and highly decorated American metal lathes produced in the years following the Civil War, this example is now in the hands of an expert and sympathetic owner. The machine showed evidence of only the lightest use, was remarkably complete and is certainly in the best state of preservation of any known example - it retains 98% of its original paint and decoration. When stripped, the apron showed no signs of wear; there were no nicks or dings, no swarf congealed inside it,  and remarkably, even the turned wood plugs in the oil hole were still in place. The restoration was with the help of several professional museum conservators, the aim being to retain as much as possible of the lathe's original finish and decorations. Over one hundred hours were spent using solvents and small brushes to take off the dirt.
While the lathe retains the belt-driven power shaft and the bevel-gear drive to the leadscrew of other Baldwin lathes, instead of being on the back of the bed - as on all other known examples - on this machine the leadscrew runs across the front.