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 328

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
108	21 April 1863	John Therder Heamann Annie Maule		Bachelor Spinster	Accountant	33 23	Dunedin Dunedin	3 years 8 months	In house of Henry Moren, Bell Hill, Dunedin	1172		21 April 1863	Rev. D. M. Stuart
109	22 April 1863	William M. Donald Ellen Devan	William McDonald Ellen Devon 💍 1863/5329	Bachelor Spinster	Laborer	28 20	Dunedin Dunedin	18 months 12 months	In the Roman Catholic Chapel, Dunedin	1073	No person entitled to give consent	22 April 1863	Rev D. Mores
110	24 April 1863	Joseph Ogilvie Mary Falconer	Joseph Ogilvie Mary Falconer 💍 1863/5028	Bachelor Spinster	Blacksmith	24 25	Dunedin Dunedin	7 days 2 years	In the house of John How, Dunedin	1171		24 April 1863	Rev. D. M. Stuart
111	28 April 1863	David Guffie Janet Anderson	David Guffie Janet Anderson 💍 1863/4163	Bachelor Spinster	Carrier	34 25	Dunedin Dunedin	9 months 3 days	In the house of David Guffie, Maitland Street, Dunedin	1443
112	28 April 1863	David Guffie Janet Anderson	David Guffie Janet Anderson 💍 1863/4163	Bachelor Spinster	Carrier	34 25	Dunedin Dunedin	9 months 3 days	In the Waverley Hotel, Moray Place, Dunedin	1443		28 April 1863	Rev. Thomas Burns
113	28 April 1863	Thomas Godfrey Catherine Manchilan	Thomas Godfrey Catherine Mauchlin 💍 1863/5344	Bachelor Spinster	Carrier	25 21	Dunedin Dunedin	14 months 5 months	In the Episcopal Church, Dunedin	1078		28 April 1863	Rev. Edward G. Edwards
114	28 April 1863	Samuel Nasmith Kathleen Dorothea Kerr	Samuel Nasmith Kathleen Dorothea Kerr 💍 1863/5022	Bachelor Spinster	Clerk	31 21	Dunedin Dunedin	6 months 3 months	In the house of Mrs. Kerr, High Street, Dunedin	1169		28 April 1863	Rev. D. M. Stuart
115	29 April 1863	Samuel Heath Little Jane Elizabeth Townsby	Samuel Heart Little Jane Elizabeth Townley 💍 1863/5025	Bachelor Spinster	Commission Agent	30 21	Dunedin Dunedin	1 year 1 month	In the house of Samuel Heath Little, Regent Road, Dunedin	1170		29 April 1863	Rev. D. M. Stuart
116	1 May 1863	Hector Morrison Johan Armstrong	Hector Morrison Johan Armstrong 💍 1863/5019	Bachelor Spinster	Shepherd	23 19	Dunedin Dunedin	14 days 14 days	In Knox Church, Dunedin	1168	No person entitled to give consent	1 May 1863	Rev. D. M. Stuart

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).