Intentions to Marry, 1858

Reference: Registrar-General of Births, Deaths and Marriages, Notices of intention to marry, Series 8937, R2840370, Archives New Zealand Te Rua Mahara o te Kāwanatanga, Wellington

Imaged by Luke Howison at Archives NZ Wellington, December 13 2024

Page 022

District of Auckland Quarter ending 31 March 1858

No	Date of Notice	Names and Surnames of Parties	BDM Match	Condition	Calling or Profession	Age	Dwelling Place	Length of Residence	Marriage Place	Consent	Date of Certificate	Officiating Minister
381	7 January 1858	Peter Beek Rebreca Kelly	Peter Beck Rebecca Kelly 💍 1858/2103	Widower Spinster	Barman	57 26	Queen Street, Auckland Hobson Street, Auckland	17 years 2 years	St. Paul's Church, Auckland		7 January 1858	Rev. J. F. Lloyd
382	8 January 1858	John Scott Honor Dempsey	John Scott Honora Dempsey 💍 1858/2000	Bachelor Spinster	Policeman	25 18	Auckland Auckland	2 1/2 years 10 years	Roman Catholic Church, Howick	William Dempsey, Father	8 January 1858	Rev. Mr. Fynes
383	11 January 1858	William Ward Yates Emily Booth	William Ward Yates Emily Booth 💍 1858/1145	Bachelor Spinster	Draper Milliner	31 27	Auckland Auckland	2 years about 2 yrs	Dwelling house of Mr Smith, Shoemaker, Shortland St. Auckland		11 January 1858	Rev. David Bauer
384	13 January 1858	John Campbell Ann McLean	John Campbell Ann McLean 💍 1858/1102	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer Servant	23 25	Hobson St. Auckland Princess St. Auckland	3 years 18 months	Dwelling house of Samuel Teague, West Queen Street, Auckland		2 February 1858	Rev. David Bruce [?]
385	14 January 1858	Patrick Walles Hogan Mary McCauley	Patrick Hogan Mary McCawley 💍 1858/1305	Bachelor Spinster	Painter Servant	22 23	Onehunga Onehunga	2 years 2 years	Roman Catholic Church, Auckland		14 January 1858	Very Rev. Jas. McDonald
386	15 January 1858	Christopher Hammond Christina McLeod	Christopher Hammond Christina McLeod 💍 1858/2112	Bachelor Spinster	Sergeant, H.M. 58th Regt. Servant	24 20	Auckland Auckland	8 years 12 months	St. Paul's Church, Auckland	Kenneth McLeod, Father	15 January 1858	Rev. David Jones
387	20 January 1858	John Flynn Mary Harkins	John Flynn Mary Harkin 💍 1858/1308	Bachelor Spinster	Draper	27 17	Princes Street, Auckland Shortland St, Auckland	6 months From Birth	Roman Catholic Church, Auckland	Hugh Coolihan, Guardian	2 February 1858	Right Rev. Bishop Pompallier

These records have been automatically transcribed and must be verified using the page image (below)

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What is an Intention to Marry?

The 1854 Marriage Act required Pakeha settlers (and later Maori) to register their intention to marry from 1855. The resulting Notices of intention to marry were sent by the district registrars to the Registrar-General of Births, Deaths and Marriages and bound into large volumes, each containing a year of notices. These registers were eventually deposited with Archives New Zealand.

What information does an ItM record?

A typical Intention to Marry notice records:

the bride and groom's full names
occupation of the groom (and sometimes the bride)
their ages
district where the marriage would take place
how long they had resided in the district
Where the marriage would take place (eg, a specific church)
Who would officiate the marriage (eg, a minister)
The date of the notice and also a date when the certificate was issued. Marriages had to take place within 3 months, and usually occurred within a week or so of the certificate date.
If one of the parties was under 21, a parent who consented to their marriage was usually specified

These details can provide clues for genealogical and historical research. Knowing the date and district makes it easier to look for wedding notices in Papers Past, and the amount of time that the parties had resided in a district can offer clues to whether a person was born in NZ, or when they immigrated.

However, finding individual records in the Intentions to Marry registers was typically a slow and manual process, usually requiring an in-person visit to Archives NZ's Wellington office (during limited opening hours) and using a handwritten card catalogue index to look up individual names.

Eight years of the registers had been digitised by Archives NZ prior to 2024, but even these digital versions required the use of a manual index and usually examining several pages to locate specific records.

What is the Intentions to Marry Project?

This project aims to transcribe the New Zealand Intentions to Marry registers (from 1855 to 1925) with the assistance of new technology (AI), making the records freely available and easily searchable.

The ITM records have also been cross-referenced with the registered marriages at DIA Births, Deaths and Marriages, where possible (a small fraction of the recorded intentions to marry did not become a registered marriage).

Currently we have almost all records between 1855 and 1894. More registers will be added as the project continues.

The project is led by Luke Howison, a web developer who made the free genealogical research search tool NZ Ancestor Search Helper and Archway-style Collections Search. There are also some wonderful volunteers assisting with digitising the registers.

Can I volunteer to help?

Yes, you can! You can sign up to correct errors in the transcribed records and match ITMs with registered marriages.

I am also looking for Wellington-based volunteers to help me digitise more years of the registers. I can provide lighting equipment and a 'clicker' (to trigger your phone's camera).

How is the transcription done?

There are several steps to digitising and transcribing the records:

Digitising the registers (taking clean, straight, high-quality photos)
Processing the digitised pages by straightening, cropping and sharpening the images
Transcribing each page with a combination of AI tools
Matching each ITM with a registered marriage when possible
Human verification of the transcribed information

The main LLM (AI) used are the Google Gemini Pro and Flash models, which have excellent 'Vision' capabilities, and a generous free tier.

Archives NZ has released the register years they have digitised (1865-69, 1872, 1874 and 1880) under a Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 license.

The Intention to Marry registers (up to 1925) are more than 100 years old, so their Crown Copyright has expired, putting them in the public domain. This also applies to any 'mechanical reproductions' (eg, pictures or photocopies) of their content without substantial alteration.

The transcribed records on this website are released under the Creative Commons CC0 1.0 Universal license, which allows reusers to distribute, remix, adapt, and build upon the material in any medium or format, even for commercial purposes, while giving credit to the creator (NZ Intentions to Marry Project).