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 227

District of Christchurch Quarter ending 31 March 1861

No	Date of Notice	Names and Surnames of Parties	BDM Match	Condition	Calling or Profession	Age	Dwelling Place	Length of Residence	Marriage Place	Date of Certificate	Officiating Minister
73	3 January 1861	Hugh McLellan Sarah Playsted	Hugh McLellan Sarah Playsted 💍 1861/3621	Bachelor Spinster	Mariner	25 22	Ch Ch do	3 days 9 years	St Andrews Church	3 January 1861	Chas Frazer
74	5 January 1861	Alfred Hatter Money Elizabeth Vinecombe	Alfred Walter Money Ann Elizabeth Kinnicombe Roberts 💍 1861/3389	Bachelor Spinster	Stable Keeper	32 26	do do	2 1/2 years 1 month	St Michaels	5 January 1861	C. Alabaster
75	5 January 1861	Charles Griffiths Elizabeth Shreeve	Charles Griffiths Elizabeth Shreeve 💍 1861/3515	Widower Spinster	Printer Servant	36 42	Prebbleton Ch Ch	9 months 1 month	Mr Taylors house	5 January 1861	Chas Frazer
76	8 January 1861	Geo Hy Giggs Mary Elizth Dillloway	George Henry Giggs Mary Elizabeth Dilloway 💍 1861/3565	Bachelor Spinster	Publican	25 21	River Ricarton	7 years do	Ricarton Church	8 January 1861	Venbl. O. Mathias
77	9 January 1861	Henry Bryan Mary Ann Eton	Henry Bryan Mary Ann Eaton 💍 1861/3502	Bachelor Spinster	Stockman	21 30	Ricarton Gorge Ch Ch	10 years 2 do	Church	9 January 1861	Chas Alabaster
78	9 January 1861	John Lockstone Martha Everson	John Lockstone Martha Eveson 💍 1861/3624	Bachelor Spinster	Sawyer Servant	38 35	Ch Ch do	2 weeks do	St Andrews Church	9 January 1861	Chas Frazer
79	12 January 1861	John Hard Chucklet Carries Gee	John Ward Shackleton Harriett Gee 💍 1861/3260	Bachelor Spinster	Draper	23 21	do Lyttelton	1 year 9 do	Lyttelton Church	12 January 1861	I. Knowles
80	14 January 1861	James Hays Mary Bingham	James Hays Mary Bingham 💍 1861/3521	Bachelor Spinster	Blacksmith Dressmaker	22 20	Lower Lincoln Ch Ch	1 year 3 days	St Andrews Church	25 January 1861	Chas Frazer
81	22 January 1861	James Howard Rosa Smith	[No matching marriage registration has been located]	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer Servant	30 24	Christchurch Christchurch	3 days 10/11 years	Mr Tolley's house, Ch Ch.
82	25 January 1861	Thos Clark Mina Kend	Thomas Clark Mina Keand 💍 1861/3392	Widower Spinster	Labourer Servant	30 30	Ricarton Christchurch	1 year 3 days	St Michaels	31 January 1861	C. Bowen
83	31 January 1861	Wm James Jenkins Elizth Joyce	William James Jenkins Elizabeth Joyce 💍 1861/3457	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer	26 25	Ricarton do	3 days 2 weeks	Church	16 February 1861	C. Frazer
84	2 February 1861	Richd Boulton Jane Robison	Richard Boulton Jane Robinson 💍 1861/3530	Widower Widow	Farmer Servant	57 41	Avonhead Christchurch	1 month 1 month	Church

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).