Background
Lindsay was the fifth son of James Lindsay, 26th Earl of Crawford, by Emily Florence Bootle-Wilbraham, daughter of Colonel the Honourable Edward Bootle-Wilbraham, second son of Edward Bootle-Wilbraham, 1st Baron Skelmersdale.
Lindsay was the fifth son of James Lindsay, 26th Earl of Crawford, by Emily Florence Bootle-Wilbraham, daughter of Colonel the Honourable Edward Bootle-Wilbraham, second son of Edward Bootle-Wilbraham, 1st Baron Skelmersdale.
He was educated at Winchester.
He was Ambassador to Turkey from 1925 to 1926 and to Germany from 1926 to 1928, Permanent Under-Secretary for Foreign Affairs from 1928 to 1930 and Ambassador to the United States from 1930 to 1939. Lindsay was appointed Third Secretary in the Diplomatic Service in January 1901, and advanced to First Secretary in 1911. From 1919 to 1920 he was Councillor of the Embassy in Washington District of Columbia, before being posted as Minister Plenipotentiary to France in September 1920.
Following this, in 1921, he was appointed the Assistant Under-Secretary of State for the Foreign Office, a post he held until 1924.
In 1925, he was appointed the Ambassador to Turkey and was sworn of the Privy Council later that year. In 1926, he moved to become Ambassador to Germany.
He returned to London in 1928 to become the Permanent Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, the civil service head of the Foreign Office. After two years as Permanent Secretary, Lindsay was named as the Ambassador to the United States in November 1929 and took up the position early the next year.
He was the first ambassador to move into the brand-new British embassy in 1930, and remained in Washington for almost a decade, retiring in June 1939 to be replaced by Lord Lothian.
Lindsay served an extraordinarily long term of nine years as United States. ambassador, his tenure being extended because of his effectiveness as a diplomat and the growing importance of American assistance during the years leading up to World World War World War II His last major official act as ambassador was to host the 1939 Royal Garden Party for King George VI and Queen Elizabeth during the first-ever visit to the United States by a reigning British monarch. Their visit was controversial, given the then strong “America First” isolationism prevalent in the country, and the Royal Garden Party at the British Embassy was considered the social event of the year in Washington.