Intentions to Marry, 1861

Reference: Registrar-General of Births, Deaths and Marriages, Notices of intention to marry, Series 8937, R2840373, Archives New Zealand Te Rua Mahara o te Kāwanatanga, Wellington

Imaged by Luke Howison at Archives NZ Wellington, December 11 2024

Page 183

District of Nelson Quarter ending 30 September 1861

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
66	26 August 1861	John Saul Miller Sarah Glen	John Paul Miller Sarah Glen 💍 1861/3741	Bachelor Widow	Carpenter	35 20	City of Nelson City of Nelson	3 years 12 months	at the Wesleyan		26 August 1861	Rev. Jonathan Innes
67	3 September 1861	John Henry Rowe Ada Smart	John Henry Rowe Ada Smart 💍 1861/3650	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer	21 17	Grove Street Nelson Collingwood St. Nelson	19 years 6 years	Chapel Haroy th nelson	Robert Smart, father	3 September 1861	Rev. Patrick Calder
68	3 September 1861	John Evans Aun David	John Evans Ann Davis 💍 1861/4058	Bachelor Widow	Labourer	40 34	City of Nelson City of Nelson	3 months 10 months	at the residence of William Jones Butcher		3 September 1861	Rev. Patrick Calder
69	4 September 1861	Thomas Guningham Eliza Epps	Thomas Cunningham Eliza Epps 💍 1861/3744	Widower Spinster	Farmer	42 30	City of Nelson City of Nelson	6 weeks 19 years	at the presbyterian		4 September 1861	Rev. Jonathan Innes
70	14 September 1861	George Matthew York Sarah Burch	George Matthew York Sarah Burch 💍 1861/3704	Bachelor Spinster	Butcher	26 17	City of Nelson City of Nelson	5 years 7 years	Church in Nelson	James Burch, father	14 September 1861	Rev. Henry Meysey Turton
71	19 September 1861	George Hooper Martha Ann Belcher	George Hooper Martha Ann Belcher 💍 1861/3747	Bachelor Spinster	Carpenter	27 21	City of Nelson Waimea East	5 years 5 years	at the protestant Episcopalian Church		19 September 1861	Rev. James Moorhouse
72	20 September 1861	Alfred Amos Mary Ann Parmenter	Alfred Amos Mary Ann Parmenter 💍 1861/1920	Bachelor Spinster	Carpenter	29 25	City of Nelson City of Nelson	5 years 4 years	at the residence of Job Aldridge farmer
73	26 September 1861	Frederick Robert Millard Jane Maria Struter	Frederick Robert Millard Jane Maria Streeter 💍 1861/3823	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer	28 21	Waimea West Waimea West	2 years 7 years	at the residence of Alfred Amos carpenter		26 September 1861	Rev. Decimus Dolamore
74	30 September 1861	Charles Brown Emma Kite	Charles Brown Emma Kite 💍 1861/3721	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer	25 18	Richmond Waimea Richmond Waimea	3 years 16 years	at the residence of Samuel Millard Labourer	Priscilla Kite, mother	30 September 1861	Rev. Samuel Poole

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).