Lindsay History

Lindsay had once been one of the little kingdoms of England, in Lincolnshire. When Earl David of Huntingdon succeeded his brother as King of Scots in 1124, William of Lindsay accompanied David to his kingdom; William' s son Walter was a justiciar of Scotland and sat in the Parliament of 1145. Sir David Lindsay of Crawford and the Byres became one of the Regents of Scotland in 1255 ,and then High Chamberlain. He joined the crusade of St. Louis, King of France, and died in Egypt in 1268. It was in such families that the War of Independence presented a particularly painful choice. They forfeited most of their English lands and positions.It was the pilgrim' s son, Sir David Lindsay who was created Earl of Crawford in 1398, and later became Admiral of Scotland. The heads of the great house of Lindsay continued in their loyalty to the Stewart sovereigns. The 6th Earl died near James IV on the field of Flodden in 1513 and the 10th Earl was a faithful adherent of Mary, Queen of Scots. The 16th Earl commanded a regiment of horse for Charles I until he was captured. When he died in 1652, the title passed to a cadet branch first of Spynie, then of Balcarres, which was an earldom. Edzell Castle, Brechin, was acquired by the Crawford Lindsays, who built a new castle in the sixteenth century. This line continued the same tradition at the Revolution of 1688 and in the Jacobite rising of 1715; but it secured an indemnification, and in the 18th century the lines of Crawford and Balcarres were united. Sir David Lindsay, of the Mount (1490-1567), poet and reformer, and Robert Lindsay of Pitscottie (16th century), author of The Chronicles of Scotland, are two of Scotland's celebrated literary men. Sir David Lindsay, 28th Earl of Crawford and 11th of Balcarres was a Trustee of the Tate Gallery, the National Gallery and the British Museum.