1862 Intentions to Marry

Reference: Registrar-General of Births, Deaths and Marriages, Notices of intention to marry, Series 8937, R2840374, Archives New Zealand Te Rua Mahara o te Kāwanatanga, Wellington

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

Page 319

District of Dunedin Quarter ending 30 June 1862

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
120	20 June 1862	James Smith Isabella Lark	James Smith Isabella Park 💍 1862/2928	Bachelor Spinster	Merchant	35 21	Dunedin Dunedin	12 years 2 years	In the house of [UNCLEAR] Haigh Street Dunedin		20 June 1862	Rev. Thomas Burns, D.D.
121	21 June 1862	Robert Murray Mary Epson	Robert Murray Mary Esson 💍 1862/3226	Bachelor Spinster	Carpenter	40 34	Tokomairiro Dunedin	8 years 2 years	In the house of George Millar, Tokomairiro Moray Place Dunedin		21 June 1862	Rev. Donald M. Stuart
121	21 June 1862	Thomas Ireland Agnes Louisa Barney	Thos Ireland Agnes Louisa Carney 💍 1862/3232	Bachelor Spinster	Laborer	21 22	Dunedin Dunedin	7 months 3 months	In the house of Peter Ireland King Street, Dunedin		21 June 1862	Rev. Donald M. Stuart
121	24 June 1862	William Birss Helen Epson	Wm Birss Helen Esson 💍 1862/3229	Bachelor Spinster	Mill-Wright	26 30	Dunedin Dunedin	3 days 3 years	In the house of George Millar Moray Place, Dunedin		24 June 1862	Rev. D. M. Stuart
122	25 June 1862	John Charles Miller Ann Robertson	John Charles Miller Ann Robertson 💍 1862/3235	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	27 18	Tomahawk Anderson's Bay	5 months 14 years	In the house of Thomas Robert Anderson's Bay	Thomas Robertson, Father	25 June 1862	Rev. D. M. Stuart
123	25 June 1862	William James Balfour Junior Louisa Stuart Kenton	William James Balfour Junor Louisa Stuart Renton 💍 1862/3319	Bachelor Spinster	Settler	24 22	Wakari Halfway Bush	2 years 3 weeks	In the Episcopal Church, Dunedin		25 June 1862	Rev. Edward G. Edwards
124	26 June 1862	William Allen Ellen Ross	William Allen Ellen Ross 💍 1862/2377	Bachelor Spinster	Coachman	27 28	Dunedin Dunedin	3 months 10 days	In the house of William Allen Street, Dunedin		26 June 1862	Rev. Edward G Edwards
125	26 June 1862	Thomas Merrett Wilkinson Phillippa Sinee Spreat	Thomas Merrett Wilkinson Phillippa Price Speat 💍 1862/3316	Bachelor Spinster	Druggist	36 30	Dunedin Dunedin	4 months 3 weeks	In the Episcopal Church, Dunedin		26 June 1862	Rev. Edward G. Edwards
126	27 June 1862	William Black Catherine Deuchrass	William Black Catherine Deuchrass 💍 1862/2930	Bachelor Spinster	Mariner	25 25	Dunedin Dunedin	4 weeks 4 weeks	In the house of James Deuchrass Duncan Street Dunedin		27 June 1862	Rev. Thomas Burns, DD

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).