Intentions to Marry, 1863

Reference: Registrar-General of Births, Deaths and Marriages, Notices of intention to marry, Series 8937, R2840375, Archives New Zealand Te Rua Mahara o te Kāwanatanga, Wellington

Imaged by Luke Howison at Archives NZ Wellington, December 4 2024

Page 332

District of Dunedin Quarter ending 30 June 1863

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
144	22 May 1863	James Marks Elizabeth Burns	James Marks Elizabeth Burns 💍 1863/3504	Bachelor Spinster	Mariner	24 22	Dunedin Dunedin	5 months 3 months	Knox Church	1233		22 May 1863	Rev. D. M. Stuart
145	23 May 1863	Jabez Job Ham Emily Lambert	Jabez Job Ham Emily Lambert 💍 1863/4802	Bachelor Spinster	Estate Agent	36 26	Dunedin Dunedin	1 year 7 years	In the house of Mrs Love, Dunedin	1234		23 May 1863	Rev. D. M. Stuart
146	23 May 1863	Donald McLennan Mary McPhail	Donald McLennan Mary McPhail 💍 1863/5305	Bachelor Spinster	Settler	38 30	Dunedin Dunedin	3 months 6 months	In the Office of the Registrar of Marriages, Dunedin	1065		23 May 1863	Registrar of Marriages
147	26 May 1863	William Farnie Eleanor Bayne	Wm Farnie Eleanor Bayne 💍 1863/4842	Widower Spinster	Master Mariner	33 23	Port Chalmers Dunedin	3 years 16 months	In the house of Archibald Barr, London Street, Dunedin	1228		26 May 1863	Rev. D. M. Stuart
148	28 May 1863	James Beattie Margaret Whiteside	James Beattie Margaret Whiteside 💍 1863/4793	Bachelor Spinster	Gardener	34 20	Dunedin Dunedin	9 weeks 5 weeks	In the house of James Beattie, King Street, Dunedin	1230	No person to give consent	28 May 1863	Rev. D. M. Stuart
149	28 May 1863	Walter Day Lucy Jane Wallis	Walter Day Lucy Jane Wallis 💍 1863/5659	Bachelor Spinster	Accountant	34 20	Dunedin Dunedin	13 years 1 year	In the Episcopal Church, Dunedin	1007	No person to give consent	28 May 1863	Rev. Edward G. Edwards
150	29 May 1863	Thomas Healey Elizabeth Fildesley	Thomas Collins Elizabeth Willis 💍 1863/3958 Thomas Farrell Elizabeth Kelly 💍 1863/7256	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer	28 26	Dunedin Dunedin	3 years 3 years	In the Episcopal Church, Dunedin	[UNCLEAR]		29 May 1863	Rev. Edward G. Edwards
151	29 May 1863	Alexander Chalmers Elizabeth Morrison	Alexander Chalmers Elizabeth Morrison 💍 1863/4132	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	23 21	Wakari Dunedin	14 years 4 years	In the house of James Morrison, Shoemaker, Dunedin	1453		29 May 1863	Rev. Thomas Burns
152	1 June 1863	Alexander McDonalds Elizabeth Kerr	Alexander McDonald Elizabeth Kerr 💍 1863/5668	Bachelor Spinster	Mariner	21 21	Dunedin Dunedin	12 months 2 years	In the Episcopal Church, Dunedin	1610		1 June 1863	Rev. E. G. Edwards

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).