George Chase (bishop)

George Armitage Chase MC (3 September[1] 1886 – 30 November 1971[2]) was Bishop of Ripon and Master of Selwyn College, Cambridge.

[3] His father, Frederic Chase, had been President of Queens' College, Cambridge, and Norris–Hulse Professor of Divinity before his elevation to the Bishopric of Ely in 1905.

[6] He won a Military Cross at Ypres in October, 1917, 'For conspicuous gallantry and devotion to duty in repeatedly exposing himself to heavy shell fire in order to bring in the wounded.

He had been considered for a see in England for the previous 11 years[9] He had actually been offered the bishopric of Sheffield in 1939 but had declined it on the advice of Cyril Garbett, his former vicar at Portsea, who had been appointed Bishop of Winchester in 1932 and, in 1942, would become Archbishop of York.

In 1941, Chase had been a leading candidate for the vacancy at Ely, of special interest to him for his father had held that post a generation earlier.

Owen Chadwick's biography of Archbishop Ramsey includes a tribute to Chase, as someone "mature in years and experience, a scholar, solid, stable, absolutely reliable, shy and at times remote ..." and "Good as gold and wise as Solomon.