He was thirty years old when his father died in 1622, and he represented County Dublin in the Irish House of Commons in the Parliaments of 1634 and 1639. When the rebellion of 1641 broke out, he was appointed Governor of County Dublin to command such forces as he could raise, which were to be armed by the state for the defence of Dublin county. However, according to John Lodge's "Peerage of Ireland": "...dreading the designs of the Irish, he fled into Wales with his wife, several priests, and others, and stayed there till after the cessation of arms was concluded, returning in Captain Bartlett's ship 17 March 1643."