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 146

District of Wellington Quarter ending 30 September 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
39	17 August 1860	Richard Peck Elizabeth Gaskin	Richard Peck Elizabeth Gaskin 💍 1860/1852	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	23 years 24 years	Hutt Hutt	12 years 18 months	The private residence of Mr. Pearce, Hutt Road		17 August 1860	The Rev. John Thorn, and others
40	18 August 1860	Job Wilton Ellen Curtis	Job Wilton Ellen Curtis 💍 1860/2842	Bachelor Spinster	Grazier	26 years 24 years	Wellington Wellington	19 years 19 years	The Church of England on Thorndon, known as "St Paul's"		18 August 1860	The Rev. C. H. S. Nicholls, and others
41	22 August 1860	Elijah Hayes Croucher Emily Anne County	Elijah Hayes Croucher Emily Ann Canty 💍 1860/2803	Bachelor Spinster	Mariner	27 years 19 years	Wellington Wellington	2 years 5 years	St Peter's Church in Willis Street	No person within the Colony authorised to give consent to the marriage of Emily Anne County	22 August 1860	The Rev. Arthur Stock, B. A. and others
42	27 August 1860	Arthur Luff Lucy Poutier	Arthur Luff Lucy Butler 💍 1860/2806	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer	22 years 17 years	Hutt Hutt	12 months 17 years	The Scotch Church at the Hutt	The consent of Thomas Poutier, Father of Lucy Poutier	13 September 1860	The Rev. John Thorn and others
43	31 August 1860	Waltham Kensett Laura Louisa Evelyn Wright	[No matching marriage registration has been located]	Bachelor Spinster	Master Mariner	32 years 23 years	Sydney Wellington	3 days 3 years	St Peter's Church in Willis Street		31 August 1860	The Right Rev. Charles John, Bishop of Wellington & others
44	21 September 1860	William Burgess Richardson Fanny Eliza Plimmer	William Burgess Richardson Fanny Eliza Plimmer 💍 1860/2809	Bachelor Spinster	Custom House Officer	22 years 17 years	Willis Street Lambton Quay	19 years 17 years	In the private residence of William Burgess Richardson, in Willis Street	The consent of John Plimmer, Father of Fanny Eliza Plimmer	21 September 1860	The Rev. John Warren and others
45	22 September 1860	William Henry Hunter Ann Guthrie	William Henry Hunter Ann Guthrie 💍 1860/2911	Bachelor Spinster	Settler	29 years 21 years	Wellington District of Wellington	10 days 8 years	The Residence of Thomas Guthrie Esq, Castle Point		22 September 1860	The Rev. William Ronaldson 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).