Harold Woolley, Baron Woolley
Harold Woolley, Baron Woolley, CBE (6 February 1905 – 31 July 1986) was a British farmer and life peer who led the National Farmers' Union (NFU) from 1960 to 1966.
He was the son of William and Eleanor Woolley and went to Woodhouse Grove School. A leading Cheshire farmer, he became the NFU’s Cheshire delegate in 1943, chaired the NFU Parliamentary Committee from 1947 to 1957, and later served as NFU vice president and deputy president before becoming NFU president in 1960.
Woolley was made a Commander of the Order of the British Empire in 1958 and knighted in 1964 for services to farming. On 18 January 1967 he was created a life peer as Baron Woolley, of Hatton in the County Palatine of Chester, sitting in the House of Lords as a crossbencher. He was appointed Deputy Lieutenant of Cheshire in 1969.
He married Martha Annie Jeffs in 1926; they had four sons, and she died in 1936. He then married Hazel Eileen Archer Jones in 1937; they had two daughters. Hazel died in 1975.
This page was last edited on 3 February 2026, at 11:17 (CET).