Intentions to Marry, 1864

Reference: Registrar-General of Births, Deaths and Marriages, Notices of intention to marry, Series 8937, R2840376, Archives New Zealand Te Rua Mahara o te Kāwanatanga, Wellington

Page 352

District of Dunedin Quarter ending 31 March 1864

No	Date of Notice	Names and Surnames of Parties	BDM Match	Condition	Calling or Profession	Age	Dwelling Place	Length of Residence	Marriage Place	Folio	Date of Certificate	Officiating Minister
28	27 January 1864	nicol Smith mary boleman	Nicol Smith Mary Coleman 💍 1864/5792	Bachelor Spinster	Laborer	28 22	Port Chalmers Port Chalmers	2 years 10 months	the Roman Catholic Chapel Dunedin	1578	27 January 1864	Revd. D. Moreau
29	28 January 1864	William Panton Grigor Mary Sibag	William Renton Gregor Mary Kay 💍 1864/5658	Bachelor Spinster	Doctor of Medicine	25 22	Dunedin Port Chalmers	3 days 10 days	In the Revd. William Johnstone's Manse Port Chalmers	1631	28 January 1864	Revd. William Johnston
30	28 January 1864	Jabez Hilman annie mawhinny	Jabez Holman Annie Mawhinny 💍 1864/6619	Bachelor Spinster	clerk	33 25	Dunedin Dunedin	4 months 1 month	In the house of Mr. Stuart George street Dunedin	1315	28 January 1864	Revd. D. M. Stuart
31	28 January 1864	William Garrick Elizabeth Currie	William Garrick Elizabeth Currie 💍 1864/5661	Bachelor Spinster	farmer	26 21	Portobello Portobello	1 year 8 months	In the house of the Revd. William Johnston Port Chalmers		28 January 1864	Revd. William Johnston
32	30 January 1864	John McLeod Mary Holen	Jno McLeod Mary Folen 💍 1864/6622	Bachelor Spinster	barter	25 22	Dunedin Dunedin	4 years 1 year	In the house of the Revd. D. M. Stuart George street Dunedin	1316	30 January 1864	Revd. D. M. Stuart
33	1 February 1864	John Campbell Isabella McKenzie	Jno Campbell Isabella McKenzie 💍 1864/6625 John Smaith Isabella McKenzie 💍 1864/4289	Bachelor Spinster	carpenter	28 29	Dunedin Dunedin	1 year 1 week	In Knox church Dunedin	1317	1 February 1864	Revd. C. M. Stuart
34	4 February 1864	James Dillon Ann Saughlan	James Dillon Ann Loughlan 💍 1864/5795	Bachelor Spinster	Miner	25 25	Dunedin Dunedin	6 days 2 years	In the Roman Catholic Chapel Dunedin	1579	4 February 1864	Revd. D. Moreau
35	4 February 1864	John Theyward Philidetha Sneighdar		Bachelor Widow	Miner	35 36	Dunedin Dunedin	10 days 1 month	In the Episcopal Church Dunedin	1497	4 February 1864	Revd. Edward G. Edwards
36	5 February 1864	John Campbell Susannah Balderstone Millar	Colin Campbell Susannah Balderston Miller 💍 1864/6631	Bachelor Spinster	Laborer	27 22	Dunedin Dunedin	1 year 1 year	In the Revd. D. M. Stuart's Manse George Street Dunedin	1319	5 February 1864	Revd. 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).