John Ponsonby (1608–1678) was a colonel in Oliver Cromwell's army during the Irish Confederate Wars, a member of parliament for two different Irish counties following the Parliamentarian's victory and a significant landowner granted confiscated properties in Donegal, Kilkenny and Limerick. He was born in 1608 at Haugh-Heale, near Whitehaven, Cumbria, the son of Dorothy Sands and Henry Ponsonby. He was listed as the proprietor of lands at Iverk, Kilkenny in 1641, but not resident there. He arrived at Drogheda in 1641, captain of a group of seventy-five which joined Sir Henry Tichborne's regiment the following year. In 1645, he and others plotted to seize Drogheda and place it under the control of the Scots but he was arrested when the plot was foiled and imprisoned in Dublin. The English Parliament negotiated his release. On his return to England, he commanded a cavalry regiment of the northern army. On 15 June 1647, he raised a regiment of horse for the English Commonwealth, having first petitiened Parliament. The regiment arrived in Ireland a few months later and in 1649 was amalgamated into Charles Coote's regiment under the direction of Cromwell; Ponsonby's younger brother, Henry was a regular soldier in the army. Cromwell aimed to suppress the alliance of the Catholic Confederacy and the previously defeated English Royalists. Ponsonby was made governor of Dundalk in 1649 and impressed Cromwell with his strategy to capture Carrick in November that year. During the campaign, he was promoted from major to colonel. The English army had won by 1653, but the Act of Settlement of Ireland had been prepared the year before and required a property survey, the Down Survey, which was executed by William Petty. Landowners were variously dispossessed, some as punishment for supporting the Confederation. The land was redistributed as payment in lieu of wages for the British soldiers, who had been without pay for 18 months. Ponsonby was appointed as a commissioner to receive depositions from Protestants concerning "murders" committed by the Irish during the battles. Between 1654 and 1655, he was sheriff of Wicklow and Kildare. When Charles II was installed as King of England in 1660, Ponsonby was appointed a commissioner on 19 March for executing the king's declaration for the settlement of Ireland. He became a member of parliament for Kilkenny from 1661 to 1666, was knighted and as "Sir John Ponsonby of Kidalton" became member of parliament for Tipperary