Show ContentsChace History, Family Crest & Coats of Arms

The name Chace is from the ancient Anglo-Saxon tribes of Britain. The name was given to a person who was a person who dominated as an exceptional huntsman which was derived from the Old English word chase which means to hunt. [1]

Early Origins of the Chace family

The surname Chace was first found in Hampshire where one of the first records of the family was William Chase who was Mayor of Winchester in 1464. [2]

Early History of the Chace family

This web page shows only a small excerpt of our Chace research. Another 98 words (7 lines of text) covering the years 1327 and 1393 are included under the topic Early Chace History in all our PDF Extended History products and printed products wherever possible.

Chace Spelling Variations

Sound was what guided spelling in the essentially pre-literate Middle Ages, so one person's name was often recorded under several variations during a single lifetime. Also, before the advent of the printing press and the first dictionaries, the English language was not standardized. Therefore, spelling variations were common, even among the names of the most literate people. Known variations of the Chace family name include Chase, Chases, Chasey, Chace, Chaces, Chacey, Chaise, Chaises and many more.

Early Notables of the Chace family

More information is included under the topic Early Chace Notables in all our PDF Extended History products and printed products wherever possible.

Chace Ranking

In the United States, the name Chace is the 14,957th most popular surname with an estimated 2,487 people with that name. [3]


United States Chace migration to the United States +

For political, religious, and economic reasons, thousands of English families boarded ships for Ireland, the Canadas, the America colonies, and many of smaller tropical colonies in the hope of finding better lives abroad. Although the passage on the cramped, dank ships caused many to arrive in the New World diseased and starving, those families that survived the trip often went on to make valuable contributions to those new societies to which they arrived. Investigation of the origins of family names on the North American continent has revealed that early immigrants bearing the name Chace or a variant listed above:

Chace Settlers in United States in the 17th Century
  • William Chace, who arrived in Roxbury, Massachusetts in 1630 [4]

Contemporary Notables of the name Chace (post 1700) +

  • Jonathan Chace (1829-1917), United States Representative and Senator from Rhode Island
  • James Clarke Chace (1931-2004), American historian, writing on American diplomacy and statecraft
  • Arnold Buffum Chace (1845-1932), American eleventh chancellor of Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island
  • Richard Chace Tolman (1881-1948), American mathematical physicist

USS Arizona
  • Mr. Raymond Vincent Chace, American Chief Storekeeper from California, USA working aboard the ship "USS Arizona" when she sunk during the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor on 7th December 1941, he died in the sinking [5]


  1. Lower, Mark Anthony, Patronymica Britannica, A Dictionary of Family Names of the United Kingdom. London: John Russel Smith, 1860. Print.
  2. Guppy, Henry Brougham, Homes of Family Names in Great Britain. 1890. Print.
  3. "What are the 5,000 Most Common Last Names in the U.S.?". NameCensus.com, https://namecensus.com/last-names/
  4. Filby, P. William, Meyer, Mary K., Passenger and immigration lists index : a guide to published arrival records of about 500,000 passengers who came to the United States and Canada in the seventeenth, eighteenth, and nineteenth centuries. 1982-1985 Cumulated Supplements in Four Volumes Detroit, Mich. : Gale Research Co., 1985, Print (ISBN 0-8103-1795-8)
  5. Pearl Harbour: USS Arizona Casualties List Pearl Harbour December 7, 1941. (Retrieved 2018, July 31st). Retrieved from http://pearl-harbor.com/arizona/casualtylist.html


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