  A compressible liquid-drop model (CLDM) is used to correlate uncertainties
associated with the properties of the neutron star (NS) crust with theoretical
estimates of the uncertainties associated with the equation of state (EOS) of
homogeneous neutron and nuclear matter. For the latter, we employ recent
calculations based on Hamiltonians constructed using Chiral Effective Field
theory. Fits to experimental nuclear masses are employed to constrain the CLDM
further, and we find that they disfavor some of the Chiral Hamiltonians. The
CLDM allows us to study the complex interplay between bulk, surface, curvature,
and Coulomb contributions, and their impact on the NS crust. It also reveals
how the curvature energy alters the correlation between the surface energy and
the bulk symmetry energy. Our analysis quantifies how the uncertainties
associated with the EOS of homogeneous matter implies significant uncertainties
for the composition of the crust, its proton fraction, and the volume fraction
occupied by nuclei. We find that the finite-size effects impact the crust
composition, but have a negligible effect on the net isospin asymmetry of
matter. The isospin asymmetry is largely determined by the bulk properties and
the isospin dependence of the surface energy. The most significant
uncertainties associated with matter properties in the densest regions of the
crust, the precise location of the crust-core transition, are found to be
strongly correlated with uncertainties associated with the Hamiltonians. By
adopting a unified model to describe the crust and the core of NSs, we tighten
the correlation between their global properties such as their mass-radius
relationship, moment of inertia, crust thickness, and tidal deformability with
uncertainties associated with the nuclear Hamiltonians.
