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 089

District of Wellington Quarter ending thirtieth of June 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
15	[UNCLEAR]	Alfred Judge Helen Mitchell	Alfred Judge Helen Mitchell 💍 1860/2874						Particulars of Notice given in last Quarters Return		12 April 1860	The Rev. William Kirton, & others
16	5 April 1860	John Astill Augusta Ann Salmon	John Astill Augusta Ann Salmon 💍 1860/2743	Bachelor Spinster	Butcher	24 years 19 years	Thorndon Flat Lambton Quay	2 1/2 years 13/4 years	The Church in Wellington known as St Paul's Thorndon	No Person within the Colony authorised to give consent	5th April 1860	The Right Rev. The Bishop of Wellington, and others
17	9 April 1860	James Creamer Ann Moore	James Creamer Anne Moore 💍 1860/2975	Bachelor Widow	Labourer	60 years Full age	Pipitea Street Pipitea Street	20 years 2 years	The Roman Catholic Chapel in Manners Street		9 April 1860	The Rev. J. J. P. O'Reilly and others
18	12 April 1860	William Thompson Catherine Yorston	William Thompson Catherine Yorston 💍 1860/2877	Bachelor Spinster	Mariner	24 years 22 years	Wellington Wellington	7 days 2 Months	In the Private Residence of Mrs Porter, on Thorndon Flat Wellington		12 April 1860	The Rev. William Kirton, and others
19	14 April 1860	Joseph Burne Jessie Trotter	Joseph Bourne Jessie Trotter 💍 1860/2851	Bachelor Spinster	Linen Draper	38 years 26 years	Wellington Hutt	11 years about 15 years	In the Private Residence of Mr William Trotter at the Hutt		14 April 1860	The Rev. Henry William Scott and others
20	21 April 1860	John James Chamberlain Alison Christison	John Chamberlain Alison Christison 💍 1860/2854	Bachelor Spinster	Store-Keeper	23 years 17 years	Wellington Wellington	about 14 months 17 years	In the Wesleyan Chapel in Manners Street	Peter Christison Father of Alison Christison	21 April 1860	The Rev. John Warren and others
21	23 April 1860	William Cottle Anna Maria Mee	William Cotle Anna Maria Mee 💍 1860/2857	Bachelor Spinster	Shoemaker	24 years 16 years	Tinakori Road Wellington	about 18 years about 12 years	In the Roman Catholic Church known as "St Mary's" situate at Thorndon	John Mee. Father of Anna Maria Mee	23 April 1860	The Right Rev. The Roman Catholic Bishop of Wellington and 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).