Kinnaird was a younger son of Charles Kinnaird, 8th Lord Kinnaird, and Lady Olivia Letitia Catherine, daughter of William FitzGerald, 2nd Duke of Leinster.
He was a keen farmer and, in 1862, installed a Turkish bath for cattle at his Millhill Farm at Inchture, raising the temperature higher than usual, and successfully using it in the treatment of distemper [REF].