Said to be named after John Chambers (1710–1764), a lawyer and judge in colonial New York.
Chambers was admitted to the New York bar in 1735 and later became a justice of the colony’s Supreme Court. He was an important parishioner of Trinity Church in Manhattan and married Anna Van Cortlandt. East of Centre Street, the street once continued as New Chambers Street, through the archway of the Municipal Building, until 1971.