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 437

District of Dunedin Quarter ending Oct - Dec

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
270	28 October 1865	Hugh McLevy Catherine Spellman	Hugh McAuley Catherine Spellman 💍 1865/8447	Bachelor Spinster	Miner	27 23	Dunedin Dunedin	3 days 3 days	In St. Joseph's Presbytery house Dunedin	1485		28 October 1865	Rev. D. Moreau
271	30 October 1865	Charles Boote Fanny Chase	Charles Coote Fanny Chase 💍 1865/8105	Bachelor Spinster	Warehouse Keeper	24 22	Dunedin Dunedin	2 yrs 7 yrs.	In the house of Mrs Chase York Place Dunedin	1367		30 October 1865	Rev. R. Connebee
272	30 October 1865	Robert Donnelly Margaret Allan	Robert Donnelly Margaret Allan 💍 1865/8729	Bachelor Spinster	Draper	25 24	Dunedin Dunedin	2 yrs. 2 yrs.	In the house of James Wilson Dunedin	1589	James Wilson, father of [UNCLEAR]	30 October 1865	Rev. D. M. Stuart
273	31 October 1865	William Davies Isabella Lewis	William Davies Isabella Lewis 💍 1865/3943	Bachelor Spinster	Clerk	23 24	Dunedin Dunedin	3 yrs. 3 yrs.	In the house of James Andrew Lewis Milton Portobello	1697		31 October 1865	Revd. Wm. Johnston
274	15 November 1865	George Joseph Brown Mary Alice Curtis	George Joseph Brown Mary Alice Curtis 💍 1865/8171	Bachelor Spinster	Clerk	24 17	Dunedin Dunedin	5 yrs. 1 yr.	In St. Paul's church Dunedin	1392		15 November 1865	Rev. C. G. Edwards
275	3 November 1865	Terence Haynes Bridget Weem	Terence Hynes Bridget Deem 💍 1865/8456	Bachelor Widow	Miner	25 28	Dunedin Dunedin	3 days 3 days	In St. Joseph's Presbytery house Dunedin	1488		3 November 1865	Revd. D. Moreau
276	3 November 1865	Michael Long Julia Mulan	Michael Long Julia Mulan 💍 1865/8453	Bachelor Spinster	Laborer	28 25	Dunedin Dunedin	14 months 3 yrs.	In St. Joseph's Presbytery house Dunedin	1487		3 November 1865	Revd. D. Moreau
277	3 November 1865	Walter Rodger Janet Merr	Walter Rodger Janet Kerr 💍 1865/8885	Bachelor Spinster	Grocer	29 27	Dunedin Dunedin	4½ yrs. 3½ yrs.	In the house of Walter Rodger Salisbury Street Dunedin	1642		3 November 1865	Rev. Thomas Burns D.D.
278	4 November 1865	William Hunter Elizabeth Ross	William Hunter Elizabeth Ross 💍 1865/8162	Bachelor Spinster	Publican	36 27	Dunedin Dunedin	3 days 3 days	In the Episcopal Church Dunedin	1589		4 November 1865	Rev. C. F. Edwards

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

100% Contrast

100% Brightness

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).