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 106

District of Christchurch Quarter ending 30 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
13	1 May 1860	Henry William Bachelor Dinay Cheel	Henry William Bachelor Diana Cheel 💍 1860/3603	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer	28 20	Avonside do	1 year 1 year	Avonside Church	None in the Colony	May 1 1860	Rev. the Bishop of Christchurch
14	4 May 1860	James Field Jane Mount Parkerson	James Field Jane Mount Parkerson 💍 1860/3320	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	24 21	Christchurch do	8 years 6 years	St Michaels Christchurch		May 4 1860	Venble. O. Mathias
15	10 May 1860	Thomas Dawson Harriet Holmes	Thomas Dawson Harriet Holmes 💍 1860/3612	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer Domestic Servant	26 21	Riccarton do	2 Years 2 years	Riccarton Church		May 10 1860	Venble. O. Mathias
16	12 May 1860	Thomas George Weems Mason Elizabeth Hayhurst	Thomas George W Mason Elizabeth Hayhurst 💍 1860/3367	Widower Spinster	Carpenter	41 28	Christchurch do	1 year 3 years	Wesleyan Chapel Christchurch		May 12 1860	Rev. J. Aldred
17	12 May 1860	Joseph Ashe Day Catherine Fergurson	Joseph Ashe Day Catherine Ferguson 💍 1860/3385	Widower Spinster	Surgeon	38 18	Christchurch do	1 month 1 month	Registrars Office Christchurch	Daniel [UNCLEAR], Father	May 12 1860	Alfred J. Barker
18	23 May 1860	Samuel Weston Sarah January King	Samuel Weston Sarah Janeway King 💍 1860/3326	Widower Spinster	Farmer	46 40	Christchurch do	3 days 3 days	St Michaels Christchurch		May 23 1860	Rev. C. Alabaster
19	22 May 1860	James Tait Agnes Yule	James Sail Agnes Yule 💍 1860/3615	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer Milliner	39 40	Papanui Christchurch	9 years 3 years	Papanui Church		June 5 1860	Rt. Rev. the Bishop of Christchurch
20	28 May 1860	James Potts Sarah Winfield	James Potts Sarah Winfield Brown 💍 1860/3329	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer Domestic Servant	25 29	Christchurch do	3 months 3 weeks	St Michaels Christchurch
21	10 June 1860	Christopher Brown Deering Harriet Main	Christopher Dearing Harriet Main 💍 1860/3618	Bachelor Spinster	Butcher	25 21	Papanui do	4 years 4 years	Papanui Church		June 10 1860	Rt. Rev. the Bishop of [UNCLEAR]
22	22 June 1860	John George Taylor Elizabeth Clarkson	John George Taylor Elizabeth Clarkson 💍 1860/3323	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	26 21	Christchurch do	5 days 5 days	Avonside Church
23	26 June 1860	John Morgon Sarah Jane Brooker	John Morgan Sarah Jane Brocker 💍 1860/3332	Bachelor Spinster	Tailor	22 19	Christchurch do	2 years 10 months	St Michaels Christchurch	Edward Brooker, Father	June 26 1860	Rev. C. Alabaster
24	28 June 1860	Robert Kay Agnes Reid	Robert Kay Agnes Reid 💍 1860/3561	Bachelor Spinster	Mason Domestic Servant	23 20	Christchurch Kaiapoi	1 year 1 year	Scotch Church Christchurch

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).