Being "a person of many good qualities" [1] he was created, 3 April 1622, Viscount Netterville,[2] of Dowth in the County Meath, taking his seat, 14 July 1634.
As a result, he and his eldest son seem to have played a double game during the Rebellion, professing their loyalty to the Crown while secretly offering support to the rebels.
[5] On 26 July 1644 he took the oath of association to the Irish Confederacy and was one of three commissioners sent to accompany the Papal Nuncio, Giovanni Battista Rinuccini, to Kilkenny.
[6] Under the Act for the Settlement of Ireland 1652 Lord Netterville and his eldest son were denied a pardon for their lives and estates, but he does not seem to have been seriously ill-treated.
[7] Whether this was because of his old age or because John's wife, a daughter of the leading English statesman Richard Weston, 1st Earl of Portland, used her influence on his behalf, is uncertain.