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- He was the son of George Chase and his wife Elizabeth Matilda Centlivres of Smithfield, London. In 1818 he became a member of the Company of Founders and a Freeman of the City of London, entitling him to trade in the City. He married Arabella Broome Elliott in the same year. In July 1819 he applied to the Colonial Department from 21 Giltspur Street, West Smithfield, for information on the Cape emigration scheme, and subsequently became secretary to the emigrant party led by his old schoolfellow John Bailie. He embarked on the Chapman with his wife, their infant daughter Louisa (who died on the voyage to the Cape) and three servants, Mary Williams, Francis Whittal and William Ball. Chase and his servants were initially located with Bailie's subdivision of the party at The Hope, but he applied for a separate grant of land in June 1821. The grant was approved but not measured for him at the time, as Chase moved to the newly-formed military village of Fredericksburg where he had bought an erf. When Fredericksburg was abandoned a year later Chase returned to Albany, then moved to a rented farm near Graaff Reinet. In 1825 he was granted land between the Kleinemonden Rivers in addition to his share of Bailie's party's location. He undertook a trading expedition to Klaarwater, north of the Orange River, in partnership with James Collis in June 1825. On his return he was appointed second clerk to the Landdrost of Albany, and in 1829 he became Agent to the Orphan Chamber. Mrs Arabella Chase died at Port Frances in 1830. Chase left Albany for Cape Town, where he lived for some years, first employed by the Orphan Chamber and later in private practice as a legal agent, land agent and conveyancer. In 1831 he married the widowed only daughter of Frederick Korsten, and in 1837 moved back to the Eastern Province as attorney and notary in Port Elizabeth and business partner to his father-in-law. Korsten's death in 1839 left Chase 'well and handsomely established', but he rejoined the public service after the Seventh Frontier War in 1847, first as Secretary to the Lieutenant-Governor and then as Civil Commissioner and Resident Magistrate of the new division of Albert. He became Civil Commissioner and Resident Magistrate of Uitenhage in 1849, a post he held until he retired to live at Korsten's mansion at Cradock Place 13 years later. He was a Member of the Legislative Assembly in 1864-65, and of the Legislative Council from 1866 to 1875. He died at Cradock Place in 1877, three years after the death of his second wife, leaving three children of his first marriage, Henry Nuthall Centlivres, Frederick Augustus Centlivres, Helen Arabella Centlivres (Hoets); and six of his second, Johanna Cornelia Centlivres, Mary Stuart Centlivres, John Centlivres, Cornelia Wilhelmina Centlivres, George Andries Scheuble Centlivres, and Matilda Centlivres (Backwell).
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