Page:The Biographical Dictionary of America, vol. 08.djvu/454

 PUMPELLY

PURCELl^

of Benedict Pulsifer, who settled in Ipswich, Mass.. in IGG'J, and married Susanna Waters of Salem. Mass. He attended the publii- scliool, and in 1S17 was apprenticed to Is;iac Cusiiing. book- binder, of Salem, where he developed a taste for antiquarian research. He was an assistant to lehabod Tucker, clerk of the Essex county courts, 1823-30; clerk and bookkeeper for James Munroe & Co.. publishers and booksellers, Boston, after 1841: assistant in the offices of the clerk of courts and register of deeds, Middlesex count}', where he gained a reputation for his skill in deciphering seventeenth century handwriting, and tran- scribed t lie first volume of the "Massachusetts Colony Records," for the American Antiquarian society. He was copyist for Ephriam M. Wright and N. B. Sliurtleff in 1853, when they edited the colonial records, completing them to 1688, and copyist and .subsequently editor of the " Plymouth Colonial Records," compiling volumes IX. to XII. (1859-61). He was clerk in the office of the secretary of state until about 1882; librarian of the New England Historic Genealogical society, 1849-51; its recording secretary in 1857, and a frequent contributor to the early volumes of its Register. He was married in 1867 to Lucy (Saf- ford) Wliaer, daughter of James Safford of Ciiina, Maine. He was a fellow of the American Statis- tical association, 1848-94, its librarian, 1863-65, and received the honorary degree A.M. from Amherst college in 1863. He is the author of: Inscriptionafrom the Burying Grounds of Salem, Mass. (1837); A Guide to Boston and Vicinity (1860), and an Account of the Battle of Bunker Hill, u'ith Gen. John Burgoyne's Account (1872); and edited '" The Simple Cobbler of Agawam," by Nathaniel Ward (1843); " A Political Epistle to George Washington, Esq., Commander-in-Chief of the Armies of the United States of America," by Rev. Charles H. Wharton (1881); and "The Christian's A. B.C.," an original manu-script writ- ten in the eighteenth century by an unknown writer. He died in Augusta, Me., Aug. 9, 1894.

PUMPELLY, Raphael, geologist, was born in Oswego, N.Y., Snpt. h. 1h,37; son of William and Mary Hollenback (Welles) Pumpelly; grandson of John and Hannah (Bashnell) Pumpelly and of George and Prudence (Talcot) Welles, and of Huguenot descent and Italian origin on his father's .side. He attended Owego academy, Ru.ssell's institute at New Haven, the polytech- nic schof)l in Hanover, and the Royal Mining school at Freiberg, Saxony, and traveled exten- sively in Europe, studying gpologj' and metal- lurgy, 1854-60. He had charge of Arizona mines during the Apache war of I860; made an official exploration of the island of Ypsso. 1861-63. and of the coal fields of northern China in 1H64 for the Chinese government. He also made unofficial

explorations in Corsica, 1854-60; througli central, western and northern China and Mongolia, 1863- 64, and across the Gobi desert into Siberia in 1865, and was professor of mining in the School of Mining and Practical Geology, Harvard, 1866- 73. He was married, Oct. 20, 1869, to Eliza Frances, daughter of Otis and Ann (Pope) Shep- ard of Dorchester, Mass. He conducted the geo- logical survey of the copper regions of Michigan, 1870-71; the geological survey of Missouri, 1871- 74; organized the division of economic geology in the U.S. geological survey in 1879, and was special agent of the tenth U.S. census, 1879-81. He conducted .an investigation of the soils from a sanitary standpoint for the national board of health, 1879-80; organized and conducted the Northern Transcontinental survey for collecting topographical and economic information in Da- kota, Montana and Washington territories, 1881- 84, and was chief of the Archtean division of the U.S. geological survey, 1884-90, in directing the mapping of western New England. He was elected a member of the National Academy of Sciences in 1872; was American vice-president of the international geological congress at Wash- ington in 1891, and a member of various scientific societies. He contributed to the American Jour- nal of Science, and to the transactions of other scientific societies, and is the author of: Geolo- gical Researches in China, Mongolia and Japan (1866); Across America and Asia {\%&^); Copper Bearing Rocks, part II. of Vol. I. of the "Geolo- gical Survey of Michigan " (1873); A Preliminary Report on the Iron Ores and Coal Fields of Mis- souri with an atlas, for the report of the '' Geolo- gical Survey of Missouri " (1873); Publications of the Northern Transcontinental Sui-vey (1882 and 1883); The Mining Industries of the United States in Vol. XV. of the " Census Reports" (1886). and Geology of the Green Mountains (1894).

PURCELL, John Baptist, R.C. archbishop, was born at Mallow, county Cork, Ireland, Feb. 26, 1800; son of Edward and Johanna Purcell. He came to Baltimore. Md., in 1818, entered Asbury college where he later became a tutor, and also tutored in a private famil}'. He studied at Mount St. Mary's college, Emmittsburg, Md., 1820-23, and completed his theological course at the Sem- inary of Is.sy, St. Sulpice, Paris, France, 1824-26. He was ordained priest, May 21, 1826; was professor of moral philosophy in Mount St. Mary's college, Md., 1827-28, al.so assisting the president in the theological classes, and was president of the college, 1828-33. He was ap- pointed bishop of Cincinnati, Feb. 25, 1833, as successor to the Rt. Rev. Edward Fenwick (q.v.), deceased, and was consecrated at Baltimore, Md., Oct. 13, 1833. The diocese then embraced the states of Ohio and Michigan, and the church