William Frierson Cooper

William Frierson Cooper
Born	March 11, 1820 Franklin, Williamson County, Tennessee, U.S.
Died	May 7, 1909 Brooklyn, New York City, U.S.
Resting place	Zion Presbyterian Church Cemetery, Maury County, Tennessee, U.S.
Residence	Mulberry Hill Plantation Riverview Riverwood
Alma mater	Yale College University of Pennsylvania
Occupation	Lawyer
Parent(s)	Matthew D. Cooper Mary Agnes Frierson
Relatives	Henry Cooper (brother) Duncan Brown Cooper (half-brother)

William Frierson Cooper (March 11, 1820 – May 7, 1909) was a lawyer, planter and politician. He was nominated to the Supreme Court of the Confederate States of America by President Jefferson Davis, but the court never sat because of the American Civil War. After the war, he served as the Dean of the Vanderbilt University Law School from 1874 to 1875. He was a judge of the Tennessee Supreme Court from 1878 to 1886.

Cooper was born on March 11, 1820 in Franklin, Tennessee. His father, Matthew D. Cooper, was a merchant who later became a banker in Columbia, Tennessee. His mother was Mary Agnes Frierson. His paternal grandfather, Robert Cooper, served in the American Revolutionary War. He had three brothers, including Senator Henry Cooper, and two half-brothers, including Duncan Brown Cooper. He grew up in Columbia, Tennessee, where he was raised as a Presbyterian. He wintered in New Orleans, Louisiana in 1832, and learned to speak French.

Cooper graduated from Yale College in 1838. While he was at Yale, one of his professors was Alphonso Taft. Following college, he returned home to Columbia and began the study of medicine. After two years' study in Tennessee, he went to Philadelphia, where he attended medical lectures at the University of Pennsylvania, then abandoned the medical field for law. He joined the law offices of his uncle, Chancellor Samuel Davies Frierson, in Maury County, Tennessee. He was admitted to the bar in 1841.

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