About 1570 Thorvald Christiansen changed the tradition of the family by becoming a tiller of the soil, having obtained possession of a large farm near Ribe in northern Slesvig, which to this day bears its ancient name of Volling gaard. Christian Thomsen, 1636-1704, was the first of the family to take up a learned profession; he studied theology, and being ordained a minister in the Lutheran Church, he was also the first biographer of the family, in that he left a kind of genealogy inscribed on the flyleaves of his Bible.
His grandson, Frederick Svensen, took part as corporal in a Danish auxiliary corps at the age of 17 in Marlborough’s operations in the Netherlands in the war of the Spanish Succession. Following the disbanding of his corps he took up his residence in Cologne, and after a few years he found a permanent home, about 1720, in Biebrich-Mosbach, opposite Mayence.
The two branches of the family at present are the descendants of Philip George and Johan Peter, both sons of Frederick. Johan Peter emigrated to America in 1745, leaving among his descendants Edwin Thompson Denig, the subject of this treatise; Commodore Robert Gracie Denig, United States Navy, his son; Major Robert Livingston Denig, United States Marine Corps, a distinguished soldier of the World War, and Dr. Blanche Denig, a well-known woman physician of Boston.
The descendants of Philip George include Dr. Rudolph C. Denig, professor of clinical ophthalmology in Columbia University, New York, N. Y.
Ethnologically, it may be of more than passing interest to know that the name Denig was originally Denek(e), then Deneg, which was taken as a family name by Frederick Svensen at the time he left Denmark in 1709. Until then the family had followed the old Scandinavian custom of the son taking his father’s first name with the suffix sen or son as his family name.
The Denigs came to their present name in the following manner: After the Kalmar War, 1611-1613, conditions in Denmark became critical, and the Danes were hard pressed for all the necessaries of life, especially foodstuffs. They were therefore forced to import grain from neighboring countries. So it happened that Ludvig Thorvaldsen, born in 1590, was sent by his father, Thorvald Christiansen, to Valen in Westphalia, a district still renowned for its agriculture, to buy corn.
Ludvig went there every fall for three or four successive years. Eventually the Westphalians nicknamed him Deneke; “Den” meaning Dane, and the suffix “eke,” like “ike,” “ing,” and “ig,” a diminutive, derivative, or patronymic. Naturally this surname was not used at home, but it became useful when occasional trips took members of the family outside of Denmark.
The use of such a nom de guerre has always been popular with Scandinavian and kindred races like the Friesians. As the supply of available names did not meet the demand, frequent similarity of names made it difficult to avoid losing one’s identity.
When Frederick Svensen Deneg had settled in Biebrich-Mosbach the name Deneg had to undergo another change. While in the north the syllable “eg” is pronounced like “ek,” the Chatto-Franconian dialect around Mayence pronounces it like “esh.” Automatically, for euphonic reasons the name was dialectically changed to Denig. In former times such capricious changes in names were frequently made. In perusing old chronicles many names are found written in three or four different ways within one century. An instance to the point is the Frankish name of King Meroveg, who was also called Merovig, and his descendants were called Meroveger, Meroviger, and Merovinger, according to dialects spoken in the different regions of the former Frankish empire. This parallels the change of Deneg to Denig.
Upon his arrival, September 5, 1851, at Fort Union, 3 miles above the mouth of the Yellowstone River on the Missouri, Mr. Frederick Kurz, the Swiss artist, of Berne, Switzerland, who had heard some ugly rumors about Mr. Denig, wrote in his Journal (yet in manuscript): “Bellange delivered the letter he brought to a small, hard-featured man, wearing a straw hat, the brim of which was turned up in the back. He was my new bourgeois, Mr. Denig. He impressed me as a rather prosy fellow.... He ordered supper delayed on our account that we might have a better and more plentiful meal. A bell summoned me to the first table with Mr. Denig and the clerks. My eyes almost ran over with tears. There was chocolate, milk, butter, omelet, fresh meat, hot bread—what a magnificent spread. I changed my opinion at once concerning this new chief; a hard, niggardly person could not have reconciled himself to such a hospitable reception in behalf of a subordinate who was a total stranger to him” (pp. 205-206). Kurz remained with Denig three years.