Daniel Denton, son of the first Presbyterian minister in America, wrote a promotional tract in 1670 to encourage English settlement of territories lately seized from the Dutch. Denton's A Brief Description of New-York ... gives an account of the geographical features and general economy of the country surrounding New York, relates some customs of the native inhabitants, and offers incentives and advice to prospective settlers.

Denton was born around 1626 in Yorkshire, England, son of Helen Windlblank and the Reverend Richard Denton. In the 1640s he accompanied his father to Massachusetts, Connecticut, and eventually Long Island. In 1650 he was made town clerk of Hempstead, where his father was pastor, and in 1656 he held the same position in the town of Jamaica. When his father removed to Halifax, Nova Scotia, Denton remained on Long Island, and in 1664 he became one of the grantees of a patent at Elizabethtown, New Jersey. In 1665 and...