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 323

District of Dunedin Quarter ending 30 September 1862

No	Date of Notice	Names and Surnames of Parties	BDM Match	Condition	Calling or Profession	Age	Dwelling Place	Length of Residence	Marriage Place	Folio	Consent	Date of Certificate	Officiating Minister
150	2 August 1862	James Young Agnes Anderson	James Young Agnes Anderson 💍 1862/2942	Widower Spinster	Settler	34 30	Blueskin Dunedin	4 years 4 years	In the house of Andrew Anderson, Dunedin			2 August 1862	Rev. Thomas Burns D.D.
151	5 August 1862	Thomas Kellett Sara Nicholas	Thomas Kellett Sarah Nichols 💍 1862/3337	Bachelor Widow	Coachman	38 28	Dunedin Dunedin	14 days 14 days	In the Episcopal Church, Dunedin			5 August 1862	Rev. Edward G. Edwards
152	6 August 1862	George Procter Catherine Gilles	George Procter Catherine Gillies 💍 1862/3104	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	36 32	Dunedin Dunedin	2 months 3 months	In Knox Church, Dunedin			6 August 1862	Rev. D. M. Stuart
153	8 August 1862	Alexander Aitchison Elizabeth Campbell Wilson	Alexr Aitchison Elizabeth Campbell Wilson 💍 1862/3110	Bachelor Spinster	Driver	32 25	Dunedin Dunedin	10 months 2 years	In the house of William Wilson, Sawyer, George Street, Port Chalmers			8 August 1862	Rev. D. M. Stuart
154	11 August 1862	Henry Nelson Mary Jones	Henry Nelson Mary Jones 💍 1862/3352	Bachelor Spinster	Doctor of Medicine	33 18	Dunedin Dunedin	4 years 8 years	In the Episcopal Church, Dunedin		John Jones, father	11 August 1862	Rev. Edward G. Edwards
155	11 August 1862	David Gray Hannah Kenny	David Gray Hannah Rhenny 💍 1862/3340	Bachelor Widow	Farmer	21 34	Dunedin Dunedin	7 days 7 days	In the Episcopal Church, Dunedin			11 August 1862	Rev. Edward G. Edwards
156	16 August 1862	James Wilson Elizabeth Christiana Baker	James Wilson Elizabeth Christiana Baker 💍 1862/3567	Bachelor Spinster	Photographer	26 24	Dunedin Oamaru	6 years 18 months	In the Northern Hotel, Oamaru	Oamaru		16 August 1862	Rev. J. C. Andrew
157	18 August 1862	William Frederick Hull Margaret McKinstry	William Frederick Hull Margaret McKinstrey 💍 1862/3343	Bachelor Spinster	Bank Clerk	22 26	Dunedin Dunedin	3 months 3 days	In the Episcopal Church, Dunedin			18 August 1862	Rev. Edward G. Edwards
158	20 August 1862	James Anderson Mary Jane Allen	James Anderson Mary Jane Allen 💍 1862/2371	Bachelor Spinster	Carpenter	24 25	Dunedin Dunedin	5 days 5 days	In the Office of the Registrar of Marriages, Dunedin			20 August 1862	Registrar of Marriages, Dunedin

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).