William Tappan Thompson (31 August 1812-24 March 1882) is chiefly remembered today as the author of Major Jones's Courtship (1843), one of the most popular humorous books published in America during the nineteenth century. Though he was born in Ravenna, Portage Country, Ohio, he lived most of his adult life in Georgia, where he became a noted humorist and journalist.

His parents, David Thompson and Catherine Kerney, both died before he reached maturity. During his teens Thompson lived in Philadelphia and obtained his first journalistic experience working for the Daily Chronicle. In 1830 he became the private secretary of James D. Westcott, who had recently been appointed Secretary of the Territory of Florida. Thompson traveled to Tallahassee, then a boisterous town on the Southern frontier, where he read law under Westcott and observed characters and scenes which he later portrayed in some of his earliest stories.

He moved to Augusta, Georgia, in...