Family name origins & meanings
- English : habitational name from a place in Derbyshire, so named from the genitive of the Old English personal name Pīl + burh (dative byrig) ‘fortified place’.
- William Pillsbury (or Pilsbury) came to MA from England as early as 1641, settling first in Dorchester and then in Ipswich. His descendant John Sargent Pillsbury (1828–1901), who made the name famous for flour, was a miller and governor of MN.