Lawyers and Lawmakers of Kentucky, by H. Levin, editor, 1897. Published
by Lewis Publishing Company, Chicago.  Reprinted by Southern Historical
Press.  p. 90.  Hickman County.

WILLIAM LINDSAY, United States senator from Kentucky, and ex-chief
justice of the court of appeals, was born in Rockbridge county, Virginia,
September 4, 1835, and is a representative of one of the old families
of that state, which saw its establishment in the new world in the latter
part of the eighteenth century.
     The ancestry is Scotch, and the grandfather, James Lindsay, was born
in 1773, on Dykehead farm in Lanark county, Scotland, where he spent the
first seventeen years of his life.  He then sailed for America, taking up
his residence in Rockbridge county, Virginia.  He followed farming as a
life work, and on the 30th of June 1797, married Agnes McCambell, who was
born in Rockbridge county, December 24, 1775, and was descended from
Scotch-Irish Presbyterian ancestry.  Andrew Lindsay, the father of Judge
Lindsay, was born in the same county, October 6, 1809, and the fifth
child and third son in a family of nine children.  All his life he spent
in his native county pursuing the vocation of a farmer, and by his
devotion to public and private duty won the respect of all with whom he
came in contact.  In January, 1834, he married Sally Gilmore Davidson,
whose ancestors--Scotch Presbyterians--had come to the Old Dominion as
early as 1745, and taken an active and prominent part in those events
which form the pioneer history of the state.  Mrs. Lindsay, who was born
October 7, 1809, died January 7, 1845, and Mr. Lindsay chose for his
second wife Mary F. Gilmore.  By each marriage he had four children. His
second wife died April 16, 1878, and his own death occurred on the 4th
of July, 1883.
     The eldest of the family is Judge William Lindsay, whose name
introduces the initial paragraph of this review.  In his parents' home
he spent his boyhood days and completed his literary education by a course
in the high school at Lexington, Virginia.  As a preparation for a
professional career he became a law student of Judge John W.
Brockenborough, of Lexington, Virginia, where he remained until 1854, when
he removed to Hickman county, Kentucky.  There he studied law under the
direction of Judge Edward Crossland, of Clinton, and in 1858 successfully
passed an examination which secured his admission to the bar.  Immediately
thereafter he began practice, his field of operation being Hickman and
the surrounding counties, where his ability was winning him substantial
recognition in a liberal patronage when the controversy between the north
and south on the slavery question and the right of a state to withdraw
from the union precipitated the civil war.
     True to the section of the country in which he was reared, and the
principles with which he had been familiar from earliest youth, Judge
Lindsay joined the army of the Confederacy in May, 1861, entering the
service as a private.  Meritorious conduct on the field of battle,
however, soon won him promotion and he was made lieutenant of Company B,
Twenty-second Tennessee infantry.  Again he was promoted, and with the rank
of captain he led his men in the battle of Belmont, Missouri, in November,
1861, also at Shiloh in April, 1862.  After the latter engagement his
company, which was composed entirely of Kentucky volunteers, was
transferred to a regiment from that state, and Mr. Lindsay was from that
on with the valiant Seventh Kentucky Infantry, serving as staff officer
with the brigade commanders, General Abe Buford, General H. B. Lyon,
Colonel Thompson and Colonel Crossland.  At the close of the war he was
paroled at Columbus, Mississippi, May 16, 1865.
     The career of Judge Lindsay in public office has covered many years
of his life, and his election has been the expression of his fellow
citizens showing their appreciation of his devotion to public interests.
At the close of the war he returned to Hickman county, and resumed the
practice of law, but in August, 1867, was made the representative of
Fulton, Hickman and Graves counties in the state senate, serving one
term.  In August, 1870, he was elected one of the judges of the court of
appeals, serving on the bench until September, 1878, and as chief
justice of the state during the last two years of his term.  He declined
a re-election and retired to private life.  He is recognized as one of
the most capable jurists that has occupied the highest judicial position
in the state; his course was marked with an unswerving fidelity to duty
and a full appreciation of the responsibility which rested upon him as
the conservator of human justice.  He wrote the opinion in the case of
the Commonwealth versus Hawes, which involved the question of extradition
and the construction of the treaty on that subject between Great Britain
and the United States, in which it was for the first time decided in any
court of last resort that a person extradited for one of the causes
named in the treaty could not be lawfully tried for an offense not named
in the warrant of extradition, without first being afforded an opportunity
to return to the country from which he had been taken.  In other states
similar decisions have since been rendered and the supreme court of the
nation set its stamp of approval upon the decision of Judge Lindsay in
the case of the United States versus Rauscher, where a like decision was
given.  He brought all the powers of a strong mind, a comprehensive
knowledge of law and a sound and unbiased judgment to bear upon the
intricate questions that were presented before the court of appeals, and
the rectitude of his public conduct was above suspicion.
     In 1889 Judge Lindsay again occupied a seat in the Kentucky senate as
the representative of Anderson, Mercer and Franklin counties, and in 1891
he was appointed a member at large of the World's Colombian Exposition,
serving until February, 1893, when he resigned.  He had been further
honored in January, 1892, by an appointment, tendered him by President
Harrison, to the inter-state commerce commission, and the United States
senate set is seal of confirmation upon the appointment; but Judge Lindsay
declined the office.  When Judge G. Carlisle resigned his seat in the
United State senate in February, 1893, to assume the position of secretary
of the treasury in the cabinet of President Cleveland, Judge Lindsay was
chosen by the Kentucky legislature to fill out the unexpired term, and
in January, 1894, was re-elected for a full term to that office.
     Judge Lindsay was married in December, 1883, to Miss Eleanor Holmes.
Her beneficence if manifest in church and charitable work, while in her
home her gracious hospitality and rare culture have made the Lindsay
household the center of a brilliant society circle.  The Judge has a
daughter by a former marriage, Marion Semple Lindsay.  He is recognized
as one of the ablest statesmen and lawyers of Kentucky and a leader of
the Democracy of the nation.

Lindsay McCambell Davidson Brockenborough Crossland Gilmore
Carlisle Holmes
=
Rockbridge-VA Scotland

http://www.rootsweb.com/~kygenweb/kybiog/hickman/lindsay.w.txt