He grew up in the Geelong district, and as a young man travelled to New Zealand, then South Australia, where he was in business at Quorn and from there to Broken Hill, where he accumulated considerable wealth.
[2] He was a subscriber to the original float of the Broken Hill Proprietary Company, whose success made many investors a great deal of money.
Others on that prospectus included George McCulloch, Bowes Kelly, Harvey Patterson, and William Jamieson.
Wilson went in for an extensive program of breeding, and his autumn sales of yearlings always realised good prices.
In 1891 when the Sylvia Park stud of New Zealand was dispersed, Wilson purchased the mare Mersey (dam of Carbine) and her foal Carnage, out of Nordenfeldt, who would later win many good races for him.
Wilson quit breeding and in 1895 dispersed the St. Albans Stud on the art union principle,[5] but subsequently bought back the St Albans Estate, the horse Bill of Portland and several of his old mares, from the "lucky winners" at substantially below their valuation, and started breeding again.
When he knew death was imminent he gave instructions that his horses' racing engagements should not be disrupted, and his popular mare La Carabine which was entered for the Adelaide Cup and heavily backed by the public, was not scratched but ran, and came third.