PILLSBURY. PILSBURV. 483 His naval duty since graduating from the naval academy has been in the Pacific squadron and the Asiatic squadron, where he was participant in the engagement with the Coreans in 1S71 ; was attached to the "Swatara" on the transit of Venus expe- dition in 1874 and '75 ; was on the coast survey steamer " Blake " as executive officer ; was in the West Indian squadron, on board the " Kearsarge," 1879 to '82 ; and since that time has been attached to the coast survey service, and in command of the " Blake " nearly five years. His present rank is that of lieutenant, United States navy. Lieutenant Pillsbury has reached an en- viable position among scientific students, his labors in line of research being original in method, and applied to old fields that have been more or less superficially worked. He is inventive, and when old appliances fail to answer his demands for results, he builds new ones that will re- spond satisfactorily. His work in the Gulf Stream and ocean currents generally, has been done from an entirely different base of operations from that employed hereto- fore by scientific men. His plan to get the drift and rate of a current was to an- chor and send down a machine that would automatically record what was taking place there. But to anchor in such depths as one thousand fathoms was unheard of, and he was obliged to invent means both for safely anchoring and recording the current movements. He successfully ac- complished what he undertook, and in March, 1885, made his' first experiment. He has remained three days at anchor in 1,000 fathoms, and twelve hours at anchor in 2,176 fathoms — 13,056 feet. The average of the last twelve anchorages is about 1,800 fathoms. By his experiments in ocean currents he has established many of the laws of the Gulf Stream, and thrown light upon many of the old navigators' collections of unexplained phenomena. The work is yet in its infancy, but with deep sea anchorage and automatic re- corder, Lieutenant Pillsbury will eliminate many an uncertain factor which has here- tofore entered into calculations for posi- tions at sea, and will change materially the theories among savants regarding ocean currents. Lieutenant Pillsbury is of Puritan ances- try on both sides, dating back to 1630 in this country. His paternal grandmother was Abigail Eliot, a direct descendant of John Eliot, the Indian missionary, after whom he is named. Lieutenant Pillsbury married in Portland, Maine, August 26, 1873, Florence Green-
1, daughter of William and Helen M.
(St< vens) Aitchison. Of this union is one child : Elsie Greenwood Pillsbury. P1LSBURY, EDWIN LAKE, son of Ho- ratio Nelson and Lydia Symonds (Lake) Pilsbury, was born in Bucksport, Hancock county, Maine, April 21, 1850. His early educational training was re- ceived in the grammar and high schools of Charlestown. His first entrance into busi- ness life was made by an engagement with Champney Brothers & Co., wholesale small wares, Boston. EDWIN L. PILSBURY March 5, 1873, he opened business on his own account in the retail trade of ladies' and gents' furnishings, dry-goods, etc., in Charlestown. Here he has continued, enlarging his capacity for business in the matter of ware-rooms, etc., from time to time, as a flourishing trade has demanded, until the present. M r. Pilsbury was married in Bath, Maine, October 22, 1884, to Louise Thompson, daughter of Jacob William and Louise Middlecutt (Plane) Plumer. Of this union are two children : Mabel Lydia and Edna Louise Pilsbury. Mr. Pilsbury is past grand master, I. 0. O. F. of Massachusetts ; past dictator,
