
Richardson was born in Athens, Limestone County, on May 8, 1839, to William Richardson and Anne Davis; he was the fourth of six children. His parents were natives of Virginia who had moved to north Alabama with their families soon after it opened to settlement. Richardson's maternal grandfather was Nicholas Davis, a captain in the War of 1812 and a member of the convention that drafted Alabama's first constitution. Davis was twice a candidate for governor on the Whig ticket and served as president of the Alabama senate for five terms. On his father's side, Richardson was the descendant of a distinguished family of lawyers and planters. Richardson was educated in Athens, and he later completed his college education at the Florence Wesleyan University, now Athens State University.

When the war ended, Richardson returned to Alabama, where he was elected to represent Limestone County as a state senator from 1865-1867. During this period, he studied law, was admitted to the bar, and became a member of the early Ku Klux Klan in north Alabama. His brother, Nicholas Davis Richardson, was Grand Cyclops (president) of the Athens den (as these local groups were known), the first Ku Klux Klan den in Alabama. The Klan in Athens and north Alabama was active in opposing the efforts of the Union League to establish the Republican Party in Alabama. During the first convention of the Ku Klux Klan in 1867, William Richardson reportedly suggested Nathan Bedford Forrest as its first national Grand Cyclops after former Confederate general Robert E. Lee declined the position.
In 1867, Richardson moved to Huntsville, Madison County, and began practicing law. He married his cousin, Elizabeth Rucker, of Lynchburg, Virginia, on December 18, 1872, and the couple had five children before her death in 1891. In 1875, Richardson was elected probate judge of Madison County, an office he held until 1886. After leaving the bench, Richardson returned to practicing law in Huntsville. In 1890, he became a Democratic candidate for governor and in the convention at Montgomery garnered unanimous support of counties north of Birmingham. Though one of the leading candidates, he withdrew his name from consideration to harmonize factional differences among Democrats.

Richardson remained in office until his death in Atlantic City, New Jersey, on March 31, 1914. At his memorial address, Congressman John Burnett of Alabama, who represented the Seventh District in the northeast corner of the state, said that Richardson deserved a monument from the people of the Tennessee Valley for his work advocating for the development of water power along the Tennessee River in Alabama. That result, though, would occur after Richardson's death with the damming of the Tennessee River and much later through the founding of the Tennessee Valley Authority. He is buried in Maple Hill cemetery in Huntsville.
Additional Resources
Axford, Faye Acton. Limestone County after Appomattox, 1865-1870. Athens, Ala.: Athens Publishing Company, 1985.
Additional Resources
Axford, Faye Acton. Limestone County after Appomattox, 1865-1870. Athens, Ala.: Athens Publishing Company, 1985.
Davis, Susan Lawrence. Authentic History, Ku Klux Klan, 1865-1877. New York: American Library Service, 1924.
Edwards, Christine Williams. The Lure and Lore of Limestone County. Tuscaloosa, Ala.: Portals Press, 1978.
United States. 63rd Congress. William Richardson (late a representative from Alabama) Memorial addresses delivered in the House of Representatives of the United States, Sixty-third Congress, third session. Proceedings in the House January 31, 1915. Washington. 1915.