Intentions to Marry, 1860

Reference: Registrar-General of Births, Deaths and Marriages, Notices of intention to marry, Series 8937, R2840372, Archives New Zealand Te Rua Mahara o te Kāwanatanga, Wellington

Imaged by Luke Howison at Archives NZ Wellington, December 12 2024

Page 025

District of Wellington Quarter ending 31 March 1860

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
1	3 January 1860	Christopher Emmett Emma Vickers	Christopher Emmett Emma Vickers 💍 1860/2758	Bachelor Spinster	Warehouseman	28 years 27 years	Wellington Wellington	5 years 5 days	The Private residence of the Rev. James Buller in Manners Street		3 January 1860	The Rev. James Buller, and other
2	30 January 1860	John Cameron Catherine Caisey	John Cameron Catherine Caisey 💍 1860/2755	Bachelor Spinster	Stock-keeper	34 years 22 years	Gollan's Bay Wellington	12 years 4 years	In the Private residence of John Bannister on Lambton Quay		30 January 1860	The Rev. William Kirton & other
3	9 February 1860	John Holmes Henrietta Lucretia Baker	John Holmes Henrietta Lucretia Baker 💍 1860/2752	Bachelor Spinster	Tanner	21 years 20 years	Wellington Wellington	20 years 7 months	In the Primitive Methodist Chapel in Sydney Street	No Relation or Guardian in the Colony	9 February 1860	The Rev. Joshua Smith & others
4	11 February 1860	Benjamin Reeve Rosena Pickess	Benjamin Reeve Roseina Pickess 💍 1860/2715	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer	28 years 18 years	Johnsonville Johnsonville	6 months 14 months	at the Primitive Methodist Chapel in Sydney Street	Thomas Pickess, Father of Rosena Pickess	19 March 1860	The Rev. Joshua Smith & others
5	13 February 1860	William Seed Mary Ann Allen	William Seed Mary Ann Allen 💍 1860/2734	Widower Spinster	Landing Surveyor in H.M. Customs	32 years 19 years	Wellington Wellington	19 years 19 years	Episcopalian Church known as "St Paul's" Wellington	George Allen, Father of Mary Ann Allen	13 February 1860	The Bishop of Wellington & others
6	15 February 1860	Alfred Nesbit Brown C. Crombie Grant Johnston	Alfred Nesbit Brown Christina Crowthie Grant Johnston 💍 1860/2740	Widower Spinster	Archdeacon of Tauranga	Full age Full age	Tauranga Wellington	3 days 2 months	St Paul's Church Thorndon		15 February 1860	The Right-Rev. The Bishop of Wellington & others
7	23 February 1860	Amos Howe Ruth France the younger	Amos Howe Ruth France 💍 1860/2746	Bachelor Spinster	Fellmonger	23 years 20 years	Wellington Mount Albert near Wellington	18 years 7 years	at the Private Residence of Mr. [UNCLEAR] Gooder, in Abel Smith Street	Ruth France the mother of Ruth France the younger	23 February 1860	The Rev. John Moir & others

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).