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 083

District of AUCKLAND Quarter ending 30 September 1884

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
1947	21 September 1884	John Williams Grace Mattison formerly Murdoch	John Williams Jane Mattison 💍 1864/4696 John Williams Emma Margaret Thierry 💍 1864/3663	Bachelor Widow	Miner	40 40	White St Auckland White St Auckland	1 year 1 year	The Primitive Methodist Church Auckland		22 September 1884	Rev Joseph Long
1948	22 September 1884	William Smith Bathels Jane Smith	Richard Davis Jane Smith 💍 1865/7109	Bachelor Spinster	Compositor Domestic Servant	22 22	High St Auckland High St Auckland	22 yrs 15 mths	The Dwelling House of J.M. Auckland		23 September 1884	Rev Alex McDonald
1949	23 September 1884	Frederick Murdoch Susan Hay	Frederick Kempthorne Susan Hay 💍 1864/4542	Bachelor Spinster	Govt Clerk H.M. Customs	24 21	Parnell Free Bakers Town	3 mths 6 yrs	St Marys Church Parnell		23 September 1884	Rev J Baker
1950	23 September 1884	Isaac Lane Elizabeth Reece	Isaac Lane Elizabeth Reece 💍 1864/4372	Bachelor Spinster	Seaman	27 23	Freemans Bay Auckland Auckland	2 yrs 11 yrs	The Dwelling House of Isaac Lane Freemans Bay Auckland		23 September 1884	Rev David Bruce Tones
1951	24 September 1884	Alexander Bremner Margaret Cochrane Johnstone	Alexr Bremner Margaret Johnstone 💍 1864/9197	Bachelor Spinster	Teacher	35 18	Wairoa Wairoa	4 years 4 years	The Dwelling House of Mr Cochrane at Wairoa	John Johnstone father	24 September 1884	Rev Jno G Paterson
1952	26 September 1884	Henry Bowman Fanny McGuire	Henry Bowman Fanny McGuire 💍 1864/4837	Bachelor Spinster	Servant	33 25	Shortland Street Auckland Auckland	7 yrs 6 mths	The Dwelling House of Henry Bowman Shortland St Auckland		26 September 1884	Rev James Hill
1953	26 September 1884	Patrick O'Connor Annue Hoolahan	Patrick O'Connor Anne Hoolahan 💍 1864/8787	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	23 21	Remuera Remuera	5 yrs 10 yrs	St Patricks Catholic Church Remuera		26 September 1884	Rev James McDonald
1954	26 September 1884	John Lynskey Ellen Farrell	John Conway Ellen Carroll 💍 1864/8784	Bachelor Spinster	Shoemaker	31 22	Hotel Auckland Wyndham St Auckland	8 yrs 2 yrs	St Patricks Roman Catholic Church Wyndham St Auckland		26 September 1884	Rev James McDonald

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).