Falkiner — The Irish Guards. 19 



flames." On Lord Arran's premature death, early in 1786, shortly after 

 his father had been recalled from the Irish Government by James II., 

 the direct association of the Ormond family with the Guards was 

 maintained by the bestowal of the command of the regiment on Lord 

 Ossory, son' of the distinguished soldier-statesman of that name and 

 afterwards second Duke of Ormond, a selection which, as the new 

 Viceroy, Clarendon, reported to Sunderland, gave as lively a satisfaction 

 in Ireland as could be imagined.^ 



At the time of his original appointment, Lord Arran was too 

 junior to have acquired the military knowledge necessary in the 

 commander of the regiment in the field ; and for the Lieutenant- 

 Colonelcy Ormond selected, as we have seen. Sir William Flower, an 

 officer who was well qualified by his experience to undertake the 

 effective control of the newly enrolled corps.^ Flower, whose father 

 had come to Ireland towards the close of Queen Elizabeth's reign, and 

 had served in James the Fii'st's time as Governor of Waterford, had 

 been one of Ormond's officers in the troubled years that followed the 

 rebellion. As early as 1641, he had held a Captain's commission in 

 Ormond's own regiment of foot, which had its quarters in Christ- 

 chui'ch yard, and had formed part of the garrison of Dublin down to 

 1648; and he had risen to its command. He had suffered imprisonment 

 at the hands of the Parliamentary party on Ormond's departui'e fi'om 

 Ireland in 1648. At the Restoration, he was at once raised to eminence 

 by his old patron, becoming a member of the Privy Council, with a 

 seat in the Irish Parliament as member for St. Canice, and being 

 appointed one of the trustees for satisfying the arrears of the '49 

 officers. He received considerable grants of land ; and his son 

 extending the family influence by a matrimonial alliance with the 

 daughter of Sir John Temple, the family became important enough to 

 win, in the person of Sir William Flower's grandson, the peerage 

 of Castle Durrow, a rank which, in the generation follo-^ving, was 

 merged in the still existing dignity of the Viscounty of Ashbrook.* 



The other officers appointed to the command of companies at the 

 institution of the regiment were likewise persons of distinction. The 

 King's Company was given to Sir Nicholas Armorer, who had acted 



^ "Clarendon Correspondence," i., 229. 



- Archdall's " Lodge's Peerage," vol. v., p. 283. 



3 There is good reason to suspect that during the eclipse of the royalist fortunes 

 Flower, like not a few of Orruond's Irish adherents, was among those who conformed 

 to the government of Commonwealth, and to have held a command in Fleetwood's 

 Regiment. See the Leybm-ne-Popham Papers, Hist. MSS. Commissioners Report, 

 p. 153. 



[2*] 



