Ambrose Burnside was a general in the Union Army during the Civil War and later served as governor of Rhode Island and U.S. senator from that state. He was renowned for a kind of beard that was the opposite of the goatee: side whiskers and moustache, with a clean-shaven chin. The style was known, naturally, as Burnside's.
By itself, this word for his hairstyle had no meaning other than the name of its originator. But as memory of the general and senator faded, Burnside's was mistakenly heard as burnsides, a plural, seeming to refer to the two prominent sides of hair.
And so, through the effort of making a word make sense, sideburns entered American English and remained, allowing us to describe the look of Elvis Presley and others in the century to come.
(thanks Nicholas)
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