Alfred Crawhall Chapman was born in 1860, the son of Edward and Jane Chapman. He was the younger brother of Abel Chapman and grandson of Joseph Crawhall (a founder member of the National History Society of Northumbria). He came from a long line of sportsmen who were both accomplished hunters and acclaimed naturalists. He was a consulting engineer and ornithologist and lived in Newcastle.

Abel Chapman wrote "Alfred shared with me an innate love of wild nature and must have developed into a field zoologist of the first class. In particular, his fine ear and memory in discriminating varied bird-notes, appeared in Field, Zoologist, etc., all models of careful observation and writing."

Chapman died of typhoid at the age of 36 in 1896.