Daniel Denton - Writing History

Writing History

Denton wrote and published A Brief Description of New-York: Formerly Called New-Netherlands in London in 1670. The work was a promotional tract designed to encourage English settlement of territories recently seized from the Dutch. It is one of the earliest English accounts of the geography, climate, economy, and native inhabitants of the region that includes present-day New York City, Long Island, Staten Island, and New Jersey. The tract is perhaps most famous for its early statement of Manifest Destiny: how "a Divine Hand makes way for them by removing or cutting off the Indians, either by Wars one with the other, or by some raging mortal Disease." Denton had emigrated to America in the 1640s and was involved in land speculation in the region. The linked article (below) gives a brief account of his life and career, and discusses his vision for the westward expansion of English culture and his representation of the American wilderness as an agrarian frontier.

Though other explanations have been offered, some researchers would later conclude that it was Denton who lent his name to the naming of Denville, New Jersey.