PARSONS, John Clere (1760-1826), of Hampstead, Glasnevin, co. Dublin

Published in The History of Parliament: the House of Commons 1820-1832, ed. D.R. Fisher, 2009
Available from Cambridge University Press

Constituency

Dates

1818 - July 1821

Family and Education

b. 29 Jan. 1760, 2nd s. of Sir William Parsons, 4th bt. (d. 1791), MP [I], of Birr Castle, nr. Parsonstown, King’s Co. and Mary, da. and h. of John Clere, MP [I], of Kilburry, co. Tipperary. educ. Trinity, Dublin 1778; M. Temple 1781; King’s Inns 1785, called [I] 1792. m. Nov. 1805, Mary Anne, da. of William Moore, 3s. 2da. d. 1 May 1826.

Offices Held

KC [I] 1815; commr. of insolvent ct. [I] 1821-d.

Biography

Parsons had been returned for King’s County on the family interest in 1818 to strengthen the hand of his elder brother Lawrence, 2nd earl of Rosse, in his quest for a United Kingdom peerage, and to act as ‘trustee’ for Rosse’s eldest son, a minor. He came in again in 1820 on the same terms. A very lax attender, who had never been required to do more than go to Westminster ‘a month in the year at snatches’, he is not known to have voted or spoken in this period. He made way for his nephew as soon as he came of age in 1821, having at the same time secured promotion to the Irish bench, for which his brother had pestered successive governments on his behalf since 1803. In 1822 Rosse described him as ‘a liberal, unsuspecting man’ who ‘had been all his life friendly to every concession to the Catholics’.1 He died on the circuit at Roscommon in May 1826.2

Ref Volumes: 1820-1832

Author: Philip Salmon

Notes

  • 1. PRO NI, Rosse mss D/4/12; D/14/2; D/20/3; Add. 40297, ff. 34-35.
  • 2. Rosse mss F/21, commonplace bk.