Charles Woolley (rugby league)
New Zealand rugby league footballer
Charles Alexander Woolley is a New Zealand international rugby league footballer who represented New Zealand.
Background
Woolley was born in Adelaide, South Australia. He worked for the Fire Brigade in Auckland and in 1922 was awarded service bars for 15 years service at the City Fire Brigade's annual social.
Playing career
He played for the Grafton Athletic club in the Auckland Rugby League competition and represented Auckland against the 1914 Great Britain Lions.
Woolley fought in World War 1 with his period of service totaling 4 years and 6 days, including 3 years and 209 days overseas. He spent 1915–16 in Egypt, and 1916–18 in Western Europe. Woolley was promoted to sergeant on June 16, 1918. He was awarded the British War Medal and the Victory Medal. After the war he joined the Grammar Old Boys rugby club in 1919 and then in 1920 returned to rugby league, playing for Grafton Athletic. That same season Woolley was a part of the Auckland side that defeated the 1920 Great Britain Lions, 24–16 on 24 July and becoming the first New Zealand team to defeat Great Britain on New Zealand soil.
This brief starts where responsible research should: with the source description of “Charles Woolley (rugby league)” as new Zealand rugby league footballer. Everything that follows is an evidence route, not borrowed authority.
Why this record matters
The subject matters to the people & ideas register because the source frames it as new Zealand rugby league footballer. Its deeper value depends on whether names, dates, institutions and citations support that framing.
The entry’s evidential value lies in the named roles, institutions and publications that can be tested against primary documentation. The source revision retrieved here is dated Dec 22, 2025. The linked authority identifier is Q55367367. The first chronological checks are 1922, 1914, 1915 and 1916.
Later biographies can compress uncertainty and repeat inherited reputations, so apparently settled claims may still require comparison. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
How to read it
Read biographical claims against dates, named institutions and the cited references. Distinguish a subject’s later reputation from evidence produced during their lifetime.
- Establishing names and roles
- Building a first chronology
- Locating cited institutions
Personal papers, civil or court records, institutional files and the scholarship cited by the source.
Three-step research path
- Establish the record: confirm the title “Charles Woolley (rugby league)”, its source revision and the description used here.
- Expand the search: follow Charles Woolley (rugby league) primary sources, Charles Woolley (rugby league) archive and Charles research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
- Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.
Questions for further research
- Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Charles Woolley (rugby league)”?
- Which primary records establish identity, chronology and institutional ties?
- How has the subject’s reputation changed across later accounts?
Search terms from this dossier
This entry incorporates text from “Charles Woolley (rugby league)” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.