on 1 Feb. 1824, and left his estates to his grandson, Richard Solly, who took the name of Flood in addition to his own.
[Burke's Extinct Baronetage; Sir Jonah Barrington's Memoirs and Personal Sketches; Grattan's Life and Times of Henry Grattan; Hardy's Life of Lord Charlemont.]
FLOOD, HENRY (1732–1791), statesman and orator, illegitimate son of the Right Hon. Warden Flood, chief justice of the king's bench in Ireland, was born in 1732, and when sixteen entered Trinity College, Dublin, as a fellow commoner. After three years' residence he matriculated at Christ Church, Oxford, where he graduated M.A. 1752. He was admitted a member of the Inner Temple on 19 Jan. 1750, and for some time pursued the study of the law in England. He returned to Ireland in his twenty-seventh year, and having been elected a member for the county of Kilkenny in the Irish House of Commons, he took his seat on the opposition benches in 1759. Parliament was dissolved upon the death of George II in the following year, and Flood was returned for the borough of Callan in the place of James Agar, who was declared ‘not duly elected.’ It is generally asserted that Flood's maiden speech was an attack upon Primate Stone, who at that time was the recognised leader of the English party, and it is related that ‘during the first part of Mr. Flood's speech, his grace, who was in the House of Commons, and did not know precisely what part the new member would take, declared that he had great hopes of him; when Flood sat down his grace asserted, with some vehemence, that a duller gentleman he had never heard’ (Memoirs of the Earl of Charlemont, i. 157). His first speech, however, of which there is any authentic record was delivered on 12 Oct. 1763 (Caldwell, Irish Debates, 1766, i. 31–7). Owing to his eloquence and social position, Flood quickly became the most prominent leader of the popular party, and it was through his untiring exertions that a powerful opposition was at length organised within the Irish House of Commons. The principal objects which Flood kept steadily in view were the shortening of the duration of parliaments, the reduction of pensions, the creation of a constitutional militia, and the independence of the Irish legislature. But though these measures of reform were frequently brought forward, they were for many years rejected either by parliament or the privy council as a matter of course. For the first seven years of the new reign the political history of Ireland was uneventful, and in 1767 Flood contemplated entering the English House of Commons, but his overtures for a seat appear to have been unsuccessful (Letters to Flood, p. 42). In October 1767 Lord Townshend went over as the new lord-lieutenant. A different line of policy was adopted by the government, and in the following year the Octennial Bill was passed. With the aid of the undertakers, Flood was able successfully to oppose the ministerial scheme for the augmentation of the Irish army, and parliament was dissolved in May 1768. At the general election Flood was returned for the borough of Longford as well as for Callan, and elected to sit for the latter. About this time he became involved in a quarrel, arising out of the election contest for Callan, with James Agar of Ringwood, with whom he fought two duels. Agar challenged Flood on the second occasion in September 1769. They met in Dunmore Park, near Kilkenny, and the former was mortally wounded. Flood was formally tried at the Kilkenny assizes in April 1770, and a verdict of manslaughter in his own defence was duly returned. In order to break down the power of the undertakers, who were now in alliance with Flood and the popular party, Townshend strongly urged the government to call Flood to office. The advice was not taken, and when the new parliament met in 1769 the money bill was rejected, and a resolution declaring that it had been thrown out ‘because it did not take its rise in the House of Commons’ was carried by the opposition. On 26 Dec. parliament was suddenly prorogued, and was not summoned again for fourteen months. Flood now systematically opposed the government on every occasion, and devoted all his energies to obtain Townshend's recall. A series of papers relating to recent Irish politics, written by Langrishe, Flood, Grattan, and others, appeared from time to time in the ‘Freeman's Journal.’ These papers, which created a great sensation, were afterwards published in a collected form under the title of ‘Baratariana,’ with a dedication to Lord Townshend, written by Grattan. The contributions signed ‘Sindercombe,’ which have been attributed on insufficient grounds to Hugh Boyd, were written by Flood. Though powerful and well reasoned, they are laboured in style, and ‘certainly give no countenance to the notion started at one time that he was the author of the “Letters of Junius”’ (Lecky, Leaders of Public Opinion in Ireland, p. 75). Townshend was at length recalled in September 1772, and upon the appointment of the Earl of Harcourt as lord-lieutenant the government was conducted for a time on more liberal principles. Flood now ceased from opposition and vigorously supported the
