Page:The Biographical Dictionary of America, vol. 08.djvu/355

 PILE

PILLOW

Tegiment U.S. infantry in November, 1799. He was married in March, 1801, to Clarissa, daughter •of General John Brown of Kentucky. Upon the organization of Louisiana Territory in 1805, he was ordered on an expedition to explore and trace the head waters of the Mississippi. He embarked at St. Louis, Aug. 9, 1805, with twenty men, and after nine months' labor succeeded in discovering what he pronounced to be the source of the river. He was appointed by General Wilkinson to lead an exploring partj- into the interior of the newly-acquired terri- tory, and during this expedition discovered Pike's Peak in the Rocky mountains. The party reached the Rio del Norte, and being found on Span- ish territory they were taken to Santa Fe, where Pike's papers were taken from him. After a long examination he was re- leased, and arrived at Natchitoches, July 1, 1807, where he was commended by the U.S. government for his " zeal, perseverance, and intelligence." He was promoted captain in 1806 ; major in 1808 ; lieutenant-colonel in 1809 ; deputy quartermaster- general in 1812 ; colonel of l.jth infantry July 6, 1812 ; and brigadier-general March 12, 1813. Upon the outbreak of the war of 1812 he was appointed •adjutant and inspector-general of the army, and commanded the expedition against York, L''pper €anada, in April, 1813. He landed with 1,500 troops April 27, 1813, and captured one of the xedoubts, and while making arrangements for a further attack, an explosion took place in the British magazine, and General Pike was fatally injured by tlie falling stones. See An Account of Two Expeditions to the Sources of the Missis- sipjn (2 vols., 1810), of which Elliott Coues pub- lished a new edition (8 vols., 1895). He died in York, Canada, April 27, 1813.

PILE, William A., soldier, was born near Indianapolis, Ind., Feb. 11, 1829. He became a minister of the Methodist Episcopal church, joining the Missouri conference. In 1861 he enlisted in the Federal army as chaplain of a regiment of Missouri volunteers. He commanded a light battery in 1862 ; a regiment of infantry in 1863 ; and was promoted brigadier-general of volunteers, Dec. 26, 1863. He saw service at >Corinth. Vicksburg. and Mobile, and was mus- tered out of the volunteer service Aug. 24, 1865. He was a Republican representative from Mis-

souri in the 40th congress, 1867-69 ; was defeated for the 41st congress in 1868 ; was governor of New Mexico, 1869-70, by appointment of Presi- dent Grant, and U.S. minister to Venezuela, 1871- 74. He died at Monrovia, Cal., July 7, 1889.

PILLING, James Constantine, ethnologist, was born in Washington, D.C., Nov. 16, 1846. He attended Gonzaga college ; joined Maj. J. W. Powell's Rocky Mountain surveying expedition in 1875, and began a work of tabulating the vocabularies of the Indian tribes and collecting data concerning their mythology. In 1880 he was elected chief clerk of the bureau of eth- nology, and upon the appointment of Major Powell to the ofiBce of chief of the geological survey, he became chief clerk, in which office he continued until his death. He was an autho- rity on North American Indian bibliography, and is the author of bibliographies of the Languages of the North American Indians (1885); Eskimo Language (1887) ; Siouan Languages (1887) ; Iroquoian Languages (1888); Muskho- gean Languages (1889) ; Salishan Languages (1893) ; Wakashan Languages (1894) ; Mexican Language (1895) ; and memoirs on ethnological subjects. He died in Olney, Md., July 26, 1895.

PILLOW, Gideon Johnson, soldier, was born in Williamson county, Tenn., July 8, 1806 ; son of Gideon and Annie (Payne) Pillow ; grandson of John and Mary (Johnson) Pillow, and of Josiah Paine, a soldier in the Revolutionary war, and great-grandson of Jaspar Pillow, who emigrated from England in 1740, and settled in the Virginia colony. His paternal grandfather and his two great-uncles, Jaspar and William Pillow, were Revolutionary soldiers and were present at the surrender of Cornwallis, and his father was a soldier under General Jackson, and was conspicu- ous in the attack on the Indian fortress Nicka- jack. Gideon John- son Pillow was grad- uated from the Uni- versity of Nashville in 1827, studied law under Judge W. E. Kennedy and Wil- liam L. Brown, es- tablished himself in practice in Columbia, Tenn., and became a prominent member of the Tennessee bar. He was a member of the staff of Gov. William Carroll, with the rank of brigadier general, 1829-35, a delegate to the Democratic national convention of 1844, and afterward made for James K. Polk. Upon the out-

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