# Chatham (surname)

Source: https://namelineage.com/surname/chatham/  
Publisher: Name Lineage. Counts from the US Census Bureau; origin and etymology from Wiktionary; bearers from Wikidata. Data updated 2026-11-11.

An English habitational surname from the place name.

| Field | Value |
|---|---|
| Origin | not recorded |
| Type | place, taken from where an ancestor lived or came from |
| People in the US (2010 Census) | 4,066 |
| US rank (2010) | 8,155 of 162,253 |
| How often | about 1 in every 75,933 people |
| Change since 2000 | +0.3% (4,054 in 2000) |
| Pronunciation | /ˈtʃæð.əm/, 2 syllables |
| Variant spellings | none recorded |

## Etymology

From an Old Welsh word cēd, meaning "wood" + hām (“home”).

## Who carries it

Share of people named Chatham in the 2010 US Census by the Census's own race and ethnicity groups. The Census suppresses a share when the count behind it is small.

| Group | Share |
|---|---|
| White (not Hispanic) | 87% |
| Black (not Hispanic) | 6.0% |
| Hispanic or Latino (any race) | 2.8% |
| Asian and Pacific Islander | 1.3% |
| American Indian and Alaska Native | 0.6% |
| Two or more races | 2.0% |

## Where

Wikidata records people named Chatham in the United States and Sweden.

## People named Chatham

- Wes Chatham, American actor
- Rhys Chatham, American composer
- Hampe Faustman, actor and film director (1919-1961)

## Similar surnames

Cheatham, Chattin, Cotton, Cadena, Cedeno, Cotten, Caton, Cowden, Cauthen, Catania, Cawthon, Cayton.

## How to read these numbers

A Census count is people alive and counted in 2010, not births, and names occurring fewer than 100 times are not published at all. Ethnicity shares are the Census's own categories.