[citation needed] He participated in the Black Hawk War, and was one of the ten who crossed Little Mountain to meet Johnston's Army in 1857.

[3][1] He also was an ordinance worker in the Salt Lake Temple and he opened meetings of the church's general conference with prayer on more than one occasion.

[citation needed] Woolley was married and sealed to his first wife, Julia E. Sirls, in March 1851 and was endowed at the same time.

[3][5] Woolley was uncle to LDS Church President Spencer W. Kimball, and apostles J. Reuben Clark and John W.

[citation needed] Woolley is perhaps best known as the father of Mormon fundamentalism and amongst most fundamentalists is considered an apostle, prophet, and president of the priesthood.

It was in John Woolley's home that Jesus Christ and Joseph Smith allegedly visited Taylor on the night of September 26, 1886, and where the following day Taylor allegedly set apart five men (including John, Lorin, and George Q. Cannon) as apostles, with a special commission to keep alive celestial plural marriage by granting them the authority to set apart others in perpetuity.