Adopted 10 July 1923 on Ottawa file OBF 0784, as labelled on British Admiralty Chart 580, 1862 et seq, and on BC map 2A, 1913.

Source: BC place name cards, or correspondence to/from BC's Chief Geographer or BC Geographical Names Office

Named c1864 by Captain Richards, RN, after Rear-Admiral the Honourable Joseph Denman, FRS, commander-in-chief of the Pacific station 1864-66, flagship Sutlej......

Source: Walbran, John T; British Columbia Coast Names, 1592-1906: their origin and history; Ottawa, 1909 (republished for the Vancouver Public Library by J.J. Douglas Ltd, Vancouver, 1971)

The K'ómoks name for the whole of Denman Island is lháytayich. The Mainland Comox people often went both to Denman and to Hornby [Islands] to dig roots for basket-making, to dig shellfish, to hunt, and to get seals. At one time, Denman Island was also and important source of cedar for canoe-making. Reginald Pidcock recorded in 1862 that Denman Island 'has large quantities of Cedar Trees on it & the Comox Indians make a great number of their canoes here. They used to live on it some few months ago but the smallpox which broke out in 1862 carried some of them off and they have never returned to it since. On the southern part of the isloand, 150 metres above Boyle Point, a trench running from northwest to south-east across the island was recorded as an archaeological site in 1956. Local residents reported that they believed the trench was used as a deer trap, with the deer being driven from the north into this area and impaled on sharp stakes emplaced in the trench. (information shared in March 2008 by K'ómoks First Nation, in turn excerpted from Island Comox Land Use and Reserve History, revised draft 18 June 1999, p.136)

Source: included with note