He was born at Balmain in Sydney to grazier Samuel Wilson and Mary Elizabeth, née Maclean.
He was educated at Scotch College in Melbourne before returning to the family property at Lake Cowal near Forbes.
In the 1930s he subdivided and sold his property and purchased an experimental immigration farm; politically he was a member of the Country Party and a co-founder of the Riverina Movement, advocating a new state in western New South Wales.
He studied conditions in Europe and the Soviet Union in 1938 and was a member of the Commonwealth Liquid and Fuel Control Board from 1941 to 1942.
[1] Wilson collapsed and died on 24 April 1942 while taking a bath at Parliament House, Sydney.