At the age of sixteen he served under his uncle, Sir Horace Vere, against the Spanish forces in the Low Countries, and was knighted at Whitehall Palace on 26 June 1627.

He was also in favour with Elizabeth of Bohemia, who commended him to Archbishop Laud, when business of a domestic nature (connected probably with the recovery of Stanton Harcourt) obliged him to repair to England in 1636.

[1] On the outbreak of the Irish rebellion of 1641, he was appointed, with the rank of colonel and with a commission as governor of the city of Dublin, to conduct a detachment of foot into that kingdom for the relief of the Protestants there.

He arrived in Dublin on 31 December, but finding that in the meanwhile Sir Charles Coote had been appointed governor by the lords justices, some time elapsed before he was invested with the government of the city.

In consideration of his services in Ireland his widow received a parliamentary grant on 3 August 1648 of the lands of Corbally in County Dublin,[2] formerly in possession of Luke Netherville, an attainted rebel.