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 294

District of Dunedin Quarter ending 31 December 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
130	20 November 1861	Thomas Swanariton Jessie Ballantyne	Thomas Swanarton Jessie Ballantyne 💍 1861/3083	Bachelor Spinster	Carpenter	25 20	Dunedin Halfway Bush	1 year 6 months	In the house of Francis Ballantyne, Halfway Bush	Francis Ballantyne, Father	20 November 1861	D M Stuart
131	20 November 1861	James Tait Janet Barber Sheils	James Tait Janet Barker Thiels 💍 1861/3080 James Tait Elizabeth Sutherland 💍 1861/4107	Bachelor Spinster	Carpenter	34 24	Dunedin Dunedin	4 days 3 weeks	In the house of James Shiels, Dunedin		20 November 1861	D M Stuart
132	22 November 1861	William Copeland Janet Henderson	Wm Copeland Janet Henderson 💍 1861/3077	Bachelor Spinster	Carrier	22 23	Caversham Caversham	10 months 1 year	In the house of James Henderson, Labourer, Caversham		22 November 1861	D M Stuart
133	28 November 1861	William Morris Elizabeth M Kenzie	William Morris Elizabeth McKenzie 💍 1861/3092	Bachelor Spinster	Mariner	28 20	Dunedin Dunedin	3 years 18 months	In the house of the Rev D M Stuart, Dunedin	No Guardian in the Colony	29 November 1861	D M Stuart
134	29 November 1861	George Neil Hellen Lumgair	George Neil Helen Lumgaire 💍 1861/3086	Bachelor Spinster	Mariner	30 25	Dunedin Dunedin	2 years 8 months	In the house of David McLachlan, Maori Hill, Dunedin		29 November 1861	D M Stuart
135	30 November 1861	James Heron Sophia Gibb	James Heron Sophia Gibb 💍 1861/3089	Bachelor Spinster	Mariner	35 21	Dunedin Dunedin	18 months 12 months	In the house of the Rev D M Stuart, Stuart Street, Dunedin		30 November 1861	D M Stuart
136	2 December 1861	Joseph William Robinson Isabella Mowat Thomson	Joseph William Robinson Isabella Mouait Thomson 💍 1861/1711	Widower Spinster	Watchmaker	33 30	Dunedin Dunedin	12 months 12 months	In the house of Mr Andrew Smith Wilson Chemist, Maorihill, Dunedin		2 December 1861	D M Stuart
137	5 December 1861	Angus McQueen Ann M Millan	Angus McQueen Ann McMillan 💍 1861/3335	Bachelor Spinster	Carpenter	31 19	Dunedin Dunedin	12 days 2 years	In the house of Margaret Mc Millan, Widow, Russell Street, Dunedin	Margaret Mc Millan, Mother	5 December 1861	D M Stuart
138	6 December 1861	John Miller Jessie Greig	John Millar Jessie Greig 💍 1861/2728	Bachelor Spinster	Seaman	29 24	Dunedin Dunedin	3 years 15 months	In the house of Angus Mc Pherson, Labourer, Maclaggan Street, Dunedin		6 December 1861	Thomas Burns
139	9 December 1861	Alexander Simpson Mary Cossar	Alexr Simpson Mary Cossar 💍 1861/2734	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	28 19	Dunedin Dunedin	2 years 3 days	In the house of John Barr, Poundkeeper, Dunedin	George Cossar Father	9 December 1861	Thomas Burns

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).