1865 Intentions to Marry

Reference: Registrar-General of Births, Deaths and Marriages, Notices of intention to marry, Series 8937, R2840377, Archives New Zealand Te Rua Mahara o te Kāwanatanga, Wellington

Page 253

District of Nelson Quarter ending Jan - Mar

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
1	4 January 1865	Charles Burns Marion McPherson	Charles Burns Marian McNutchan 💍 1865/6827	Bachelor Spinster	Builder	34 26	City of Nelson City of Nelson	14 years 4 years	At the residence of Alexander Sclanders, Merchant, Brougham Street, Nelson	928		4 January 1865	Rev. Patrick Calder
2	9 January 1865	Charles Burns Marion [UNCLEAR]d Hutchon	Charles Burns Marian McNutchan 💍 1865/6827	Bachelor Spinster	Builder	34 26	City of Nelson City of Nelson	14 years 4 years	At the Manse of the Presbyterian Church in Nelson	928		9 January 1865	Rev. Patrick Calder
3	11 January 1865	William Jordan Mary Ann Oliphant	William Jordan Mary Ann Oliphant 💍 1865/6785	Widower Widow	Labourer	49	Waimea East City of Nelson	5 years 18 months	At the residence of David Whiting, Labourer, Brook Street, Nelson	913		7 February 1865	Rev. Edward Thomas
4	17 January 1865	Save Coffey Elizabeth Clara Newman	Paul Coffey Elizabeth Clara Newman 💍 1865/6701	Bachelor Spinster	Shipwright	28 21	City of Nelson City of Nelson	1 week 20 years	At the residence of Joseph Newman, Farmer, Spring Grove	884		17 January 1865	Rev. William Kirk
5	20 January 1865	William Macey Ellen Robinson	William Macey Ellen Robinson 💍 1865/6830	Widower Spinster	Baker	39 21	City of Nelson City of Nelson	1 month 20 years	At the residence of Elizabeth Shaw, wife of Joseph Shaw, Collingwood Street	929		20 January 1865	Rev. Patrick Calder
6	23 January 1865	Thomas Saunders Rogers Amelia Gapper	Thomas Sanders Rogers Amelia Gapper 💍 1865/6707	Bachelor Spinster	Store Keeper	32 23	City of Nelson City of Nelson	8 years 22 years	At the residence of Bernard Gapper, Gentleman, Appleby	886		23 January 1865	Rev. William Kirk
7	24 January 1865	John Johnson Charlotte Healey	John Johnson Charlotte Heatley 💍 1865/6872	Bachelor Spinster	Fireman	26 24	City of Nelson City of Nelson	3 years 1 week	At Christ Church Nelson	943		24 January 1865	Rev. Geo. Henry Johnstone
8	26 January 1865	George Stitt Elizabeth Ellen Sutton	George Kite Ellen Elizabeth Sutton 💍 1865/6710	Bachelor Spinster	Butcher	25 21	Richmond City of Nelson	21 years 1 week	At the residence of Lucy Rite, widow, Richmond	887		26 January 1865	Rev. James Wallis
9	14 February 1865	Frederick Bomington Mary Ann Saywell	Frederick Bonnington Mary Ann Saywell 💍 1865/6713	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	20 18	Richmond Richmond	10 years 10 years	At the residence of George Saywell, Carpenter, Richmond	888	Joseph Bomington, Father	16 February 1865	Rev. "James Wallis
10	18 February 1865	Joseph Mitchell Caroline Lees	Joseph Mitchell Caroline Eves 💍 1865/4074	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer	25 21	City of Nelson City of Nelson	3 days 3 days	At the Office of the Registrar of Marriages, Nelson	953		18 February 1865	The Registrar of Marriages
11	18 February 1865	George Rutland Jane Turner	George Rutland Jane Turner 💍 1865/6875 George Serles Olive Turner 💍 1865/7013	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	26 27	City of Nelson City of Nelson	7 days 12 months	At Christ Church Nelson	944		18 February 1865	Rev. George Henry Johnstone
12	21 February 1865	Charles Merritt Rachael Epps	Charles Merritt Rachael Epps 💍 1865/3953	Bachelor Spinster	Hotel Keeper	30 20	City of Wellington City of Nelson	2 months 20 years	At the residence of Thomas Epps, Nurseryman, Nile Street, Nelson	941	Thomas Epps, Father	21 February 1865	Rev. Edward Thomas
87	24 December 1864	Edward Gill							(Vide Return preceeding quarter)

These records have been automatically transcribed and must be verified using the page image (below)

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Attribution: This image was digitised by Archives NZ Te Rua Mahara o te Kāwanatanga and is republished here under CC BY. It has been cropped and rotated for convenience.

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).