A deep understanding of the metallic silver catalysts formation process on oxide support and the formation mechanism is of great scientific and practical meaning for exploring better catalyst preparing procedures. Herein the thermal decomposition process of supported silver catalyst with silver oxalate as the silver precursor in the presence of ethylenediamine and ethanolamine is carefully investigated by employing a variety of characterization techniques including thermal analysis, in situ diffuse reflectance infrared Fourier transform spectroscopy, scanning electron microscopy, and X-ray diffraction. The formation mechanism of supported silver particles was revealed. Results showed that formation of metallic silver begins at about $100^{circ}C$ and activation process is essentially complete below $145^{circ}C$. Formation of silver was accompanied by decomposition of oxalate group and removal of organic amines. Catalytic performance tests using the epoxidation of ethylene as a probe reaction showed that rapid activation (for 5 minutes) at a relatively low temperature ($170^{circ}C$) afforded materials with optimum catalytic performance, since higher activation temperatures and/or longer activation times resulted in sintering of the silver particles.