Chapman was born in New York City on March 2, 1862. He was the son of Henry Grafton Chapman Jr., a broker who became president of the New York Stock Exchange, and Eleanor Kingsland Jay. His paternal grandmother, Maria Weston Chapman, was one of the leading campaigners against slavery and worked with William Lloyd Garrison on The Liberator. His maternal grandparents were John Jay, the U.S. Minister to Austria-Hungary, and Eleanor Kingsland Jay. His grandfather was the son of William Jay and a grandson of Chief Justice John Jay of the United States Supreme Court. He was educated at St. Paul's School, Concord and Harvard, and after graduating in 1884, Chapman traveled around Europe before returning to study at the Harvard Law School. He was known for injuring himself so badly, in remorse after a student brawl, that medical staff amputated his left hand.
Career
He was admitted to the bar in 1888, and practiced law until 1898. Meanwhile, he had attracted attention as an essayist of unusual merit. His work is marked by originality and felicity of expression, and the opinion of many critics has placed him in the front rank of the American essayists of his day. In 1912, on the one year anniversary of the lynching of Zachariah Walker in Coatesville, Pennsylvania, Chapman gave a speech in which he called the lynching "one of the most dreadful crimes in history" and said "our whole people are...involved in the guilt." It was published as A Nation's Responsibility. Chapman became involved in politics and joined the CityReform Club and the Citizens' Union. He was opposed to the Tammany Hall political and business grouping, which at that time dominated New York City. He lectured on the need for reform and edited the journal The Political Nursery.
Personal life
On July 2, 1889, he married Minna Timmins and they had three children.
Victor Emmanuel Chapman, the first American aviator to die in France during World War I. After Victor's death, Chapman published a memoir of his son's early life and his letters from France. A copy of these letters inspired Chapman's friend Charles Loeffler to write his Music for Four Stringed Instruments
John Jay Chapman, Jr., who died in his youth in Switzerland.
Conrad Chapman, who married Judith Daphne McBurney in 1934.
Elizabeth and John Jay had one child born in 1901: Chanler Armstrong Chapman. Chanler Chaplan married Olivia James, a niece of Henry James. They divorced and he married the former Helen Riesenfeld, a writer, in 1948. After her death in 1970, he married Dr. Ida R. Holzbert Wagman in 1972. Reportedly, Chanler Chapman served as the model for Saul Bellow's 1959 novel Henderson the Rain King.
