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Bio: Col. R. H. Lindsay, Caddo Parish La
Source: Biographical and Historical Memoirs of Northwest Louisiana
The Southern Publishing Company, Chicago & Nashville, 1890
Col. R. H. Lindsay is a general commission merchant and real estate
agent of Shreveport, La., but was born in Montrose, Scotland, in 1832, and is
a son of William and Mary (Hume) Lindsay, the latter being a niece of the
celebrated Joseph Hume. The father died in his native land after serving
as a Government officer for forty-eight years, but the mother is still living. They were the parents of twelve children, of whom Col. R. H. was
the fifth in order of birth. He was educated in Scotland, served an apprenticeship in the Glasgow Apothecary Company, but in 1851 left home and
friends and started for the United States to seek his fortune, taking passage at Greenock on a sailing vessel, and landing at New York after a
forty-four days' ocean voyage. He soon after went to Milledgeville, Ga.,
where he passed an examination before the medical board, then went to New
Orleans and secured employment as a clerk in a drug store. After remaining
in that city until December, 1851, he came to Shreveport, La., under engagement for John W. Morris, who died of yellow fever in 1853. He
subsequently embarked in the grocery and cotton business, and was interested in both these enterprises at the breaking out of the Civil War.
He then abandoned his business and helped to raise the Caddo Fencivals, going out as a third lieutenant, but for faithful, efficient service and
gallantry he was promoted to the rank of captain, then to major, and finally to lieutenant-colonel, having command of the Sixteenth Louisiana
Regiment, and served as such until the final surrender. He was in nearly
all the principal engagements of the war, and at the close of hostilities
returned to Shreveport and took control of three stores belonging to some
northern parties afterward going into the cotton business, and securing an
interest in a cotton compress. He is now president of the Morris Compress
Company, is president of the board of health, and has been for three years,
and is the present assessor of Caddo Parish. He is a member of the Masonic
fraternity, the K. of P., the K. of H., and is commander of the L. of H.
He was married in 1875 in Nashville, Tenn., to a daughter of Rev. Dr. Blake, and to them two children have been born: Nannie B. and Mary H. Mr.
and Mrs. Lindsay are members of the Presbyterian Church, and he is an elder
in the same. He is a man whose honor has never been questioned, and, as he
has ever had the interests of his adopted country warmly at heart, he does
all in his power to promote her interests and gives liberally of his means
to enterprises of a worthy nature. |
