Harold Woolley, Baron Woolley

Harold Woolley, Baron Woolley, CBE (6 February 1905 – 31 July 1986) was a British farmer and life peer who served as the President of the National Farmers' Union between 1960 and 1966.^[1]

Life and career

Woolley was the son of William Woolley, JP and Eleanor Woolley, and was educated at the Woodhouse Grove School. A leading Cheshire farmer, he was elected as the Cheshire delegate to the National Farmers' Union in 1943, before chairing the NFU Parliamentary Committee between 1947 and 1957.^[2] He then served as the NUS' vice president and deputy president on several occasions, before serving as its president between 1960 and 1966.^[2]

Woolley was appointed Commander of the Order of the British Empire in the 1958 Birthday Honours^[3] and was made a Knight Bachelor in 1964 Birthday Honours "for services to farming".^[4][5] On 18 January 1967, Woolley was created a life peer as Baron Woolley, of Hatton in the County Palatine of Chester.^[6] In the House of Lords he sat as a crossbencher.^[7] He was appointed a Deputy Lieutenant of Cheshire in 1969.

Family

Woolley married Martha Annie Jeffs, with whom he had four sons, in 1926; she died in 1936. He then married Hazel Eileen Archer Jones, with whom he had two daughters, in 1937. Lady Woolley died in 1975.^[2]