Edward Thomas Watson was born on September 5, 1856, to John and Ann Maddox Watson of Thomson, Georgia. His family was descended from Georgia's early Quaker residents who had settled in 1768 in the Wrightsboro community, what would become Thomson, Georgia, and, eventually, the seat for McDuffie County. Tom Watson was raised just outside of Thomson during the Civil War and the early years of Reconstruction. One of his uncles was wounded in the Civil War, the other killed in battle; Tom's father was twice wounded in the War.

Young Tom left Thomson in 1872 to attend Mercer College, where he distinguished himself in studies of oratory and history. He spent one year teaching school outside of Macon, Georgia and then later in Screven County. Picking up a copy of Blackstone's "Commentaries on the Laws of England," Watson left teaching to read law with an Augusta attorney, passing the bar in 1875 at age 19. In 1876, Watson returned to Thomson to practice law. In 1878, he married Georgia Durham, the daughter of prominent doctor, George Durham. They had three children: John Durham, Agnes, and Louise. Louise died in 1889, possibly from diptheria. Agnes died in August 1917 from cancer; John Durham died in 1918 following surgery. John Durham's daughter, Georgia, and Agnes daughter, Georgia, both recalled growing up at Hickory Hill.

Watson was considered a powerful opponet at the bar. He would lull the prosecution by tipping his chair back, hooking his thumbs through his suspenders, and closing his eyes while listening to the the prosecutors make their cases -- he never took a single note. When he stood for the defense, Watson's nearly photographic memory served him well and the prosecutions case would be recited back and summarily disproven. Watson's defense of Charles McGregor and the Zeigler brothers are set down in Georgia history as two unwinnable murder cases where Watson secured acquittals for all defendents.

In 1882, Watson ran for a seat in Georgia's lower house. He was only 26 when elected. Disillusioned with the Legislature, and unable to accomplish significant reform, Watson resigned his seat before the end of his term. He was beginning to develop his own political creed, which was deeply rooted in the South's agricultural tradition. Supporting the struggling small farmer and the agrarian way of life formed the basis for Watson's political motivation; he declared open war on rampant industrialism; and, supported political equality for both black and white. Similarly, he embraced the platform and ideals of the emerging Farmer's Alliance. This marked the beginning of the end of Watson's relationship with the Democratic Party.

The people of the 10th District elected Watson as their Congressman in 1890. In 1892, he introduced a bill to levy an income tax and one to abolish the customs duties on jute, jute bagging, iron ties, binding twine and other materials used in cotton baling. These bills, among others he introduced, were blocked by his Congressional contemporaries in the Ways and Means Committee. Among the other issues supported by Watson, were the free coinage of silver and the 8 hour work day. These actions caused Watson to be branded as a renegade and outlaw by his fellow Democrats, who targeted him for defeat.

Espousing the Jeffersonian ideals of popular government and the rights of the common people, Watson began publishing the People's Party Paper in October 1891. He continued in the Populist vein by tackling the formation of a new political party in Georgia in 1892 - the Peopl's Party. The same year, he ran again for Congress, this time on the People's Party ticket. Watson was defeated due to whole-sale election fraud carried out by his enemies within the Democratic Party.

During his single session of Congress in 1892, Watson proposed and secured funding for an amendment to the Post Office Appropriation Bill that would become the rural free delivery system of the Post Office. The amendment passed with much discussion. Watson was declared the undisputed "father of Rural Free Delivery."

The election of 1894 was a repeat of the 1892 debacle. Democratic votes were purchased with alcohol, intimidation, and cash. Watson lost the election, though he carried 9 counties in the district to his opponents 2 counties. In 1896, Watson did not attend the DNC convention. In a case of politics making strange bed-fellows, the Democrats and the Populists fused their tickets. William Jennings Bryan of Nebraska would appear on both tickets as the Presidential candidate, and the agreement was for Tom Watson to appear as the Vice-Presidential candidate. However, the Democrats did not uphold their end of the bargain and listed railroad president and banker Arthur Sewall as the nominee for Vice-President. Following this indignity, Watson retired from public life and concentrated on authoring volumes on the history of France, biographies of Napoleon and Thomas Jefferson, and the novel "Bethany: A Story of the Old South."

In 1900, he purchased the house that would become known as Hickory Hill in Thomson, Georgia. It is believed that the house at Hickory Hill was constructed after 1864 by Captain James Wilson. It was originally designed as a 4-over-4, modest federal-style dwelling. The house and 82.5 acres of land were purchased in 1900 by Thomas Edward Watson and renovated over the subsequent 4 years to reflect the Greek Revival style popular several decades earlier during the antebellum period.

Watson was known as a generous man, though in possession of a wicked temper. He often employed entire families, black and white, who were down on their luck. The servants in the house were the only people permitted to appear in public without shoes -- in recognition that shoes were an expensive commodity.

Despite a self-imposed retirement, Watson did not stay out of politics altogether. It is widely recognized that every governor elected in Georgia from 1900 to 1922 owed his success to gaining Watson's support. In 1904, Watson ran as a protest candidate for President on the People's Party ticket, losing to Theodore Roosevelt. He ran again in 1908, during the last hurrah of the People's Party.

He was productive in his retirement. In 1906, he began publishing the monthly Tom Watson Magazine in Atlanta. In 1910, he moved the magazine, now called Watson's Jeffersonian Magazine, to Thomson, constructing a large, brick building and hiring 30 employees to run it. From the Jeffersonian Publishing Company, he also published a weekly newspaper, the Weekly Jeffersonian. Watson also penned several books while in "retirement," including "Prose Miscellanies."

In 1918, Watson entered the race for the U.S. House at the last minute -- he lost to Carl Vinson. Not defeated, in 1920, Watson ran for and won the Georgia Senate race. He left Hickory Hill for the last time in March, 1921.

Watson never missed a day of session during the 67th Congress. Despite being gravely ill during the week of September 22, 1922, he attend and spoke each day. Thomas E. Watson passed away at 2:16am on September 26, 1922. He was 67. His body was returned to Thomson in a Pullman car. A crowd of 10,000 mourners had massed in Thomson for the funeral. The Senator lay in state at Hickory Hill and was interred at the Thomson City Cemetery, near his children. Watson had written his own epitaph, borrowed from his reading of classic literature, "Here lies the enemy of the Bourbons, the Jesuits, and the Inasmuches."

Mrs. Watson died on May 14, 1923, she was also 67.

Carl Vinson eulogized Watson in this way, "In the little cemetery in the town of Thomson, where the morning-glory points its purple bugle to the sky, and the sigh of the cedars mingles its music with the soughing of the pines, the willow and cypress grown around his tomb with loving but mournful embrace which will ever be a shrine where boys and girls, men and women in generations to come will be inspired by the achievements of this illustrious son of Georgia."

At the time Watson purchased Hickory Hill, it is unclear what structures other than the house existed on the property. The well and the oak alleé are the only improvements that can be documented to the Wilson period. During his lifetime, Tom Watson owned approximately 9,000 acres of land in McDuffie County, Georgia, most of it adjoining Hickory Hill. Today, Hickory Hill encompasses 256 acres. The house is surrounded by planned gardens and flower beds, as well as thick mixed-woods areas and fields under cultivation. Throughout the woodland gardens are walks leading to two pavilions, a stone time line, a sundial, and a fruit orchard. On the site are numerous outbuildings including a tin automobile garage, a barn, three cottages, a dovecote, a smokehouse, a water tower, a cistern, a corn crib, a one-room school house, a carriage shed, and various small utility sheds. Various archaeological features dot the landscape, including the remains of the Jeffersonian Publishing Plant.

Hickory Hill was constructed just after the Civil War. It was purchased in 1900 by Thomas Edward Watson. Following the deaths of Senator Watson and his wife, the house passed into the ownership of his granddaughter, Georgia Watson. It was later purchased by her cousin-in-law, Walter J. Brown. The house remained in Mr. Brown's possession until his death when it was transfered into his Foundation. Hickory Hill was fully restored between 2000 and 2004, and opened to the public in November 2004.