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 515

District of Invercargill Quarter ending Apr - Jun

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
267	20 April 1865	David Anderson Agnes Cumming	David Anderson Agnes Cumming 💍 1865/9523	Bachelor Spinster	Blacksmith Housemaid	24 19	Invercargill Invercargill	2 1/2 years 2 years	In the house of Robert Cumming	1875		20 April 1865	A. H. Stobo
268	8 May 1865	James Scott Eliza Looney	James Scott Eliza Looney 💍 1865/4047	Widower Spinster	Labourer Servant	38 26	Invercargill Hanhville	6 days 6 days	In the English Church at Invercargill	1892		8 May 1865	M. G. Tummer
269	8 May 1865	Peter Dalrymple Rosetta Morris	Peter Dalrymple Rosetta Morris 💍 1865/9466 George Hay Rosetta Morris 💍 1865/7271	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	52 36	Appleby Nairiva	9 years 2 years	In the house of Mr. J. Tarlton at Waikiwi	1853		8 May 1865	B. Drake
270	20 May 1865	Alexander Thomas Adamson Maria Hood Barnhill	Alexander Thomas Adamson Maria Wood Barnhill 💍 1865/8261	Bachelor Spinster	Banker	29 22	Invercargill Invercargill	16 months 2 years	In the Southland Club Hotel Invercargill	1870		26 May 1865	A. H. Stobo
271	31 May 1865	Edmund Roger Fanny Frederica Williams	Edmund Rogers Fanny Frederica Rosina Williams 💍 1865/9568	Bachelor Spinster	Accountant	30 19	Invercargill Invercargill	3 years 2 years	In the English Church at Invercargill	1891	George [UNCLEAR]	31 May 1865	M. P. Tummer
272	5 June 1865	John Horney Manguies Elizabeth Frances Butler		Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	26 23	Spar Bush Ryal Bush	4 years 9 months	In the English church at Clifton, or Ryal Bush	1893		5 June 1865	M. P. Jummer
273	9 June 1865	James Sinclair Mary Greig	James Sinclair Mary Greig 💍 1865/9469	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer	28 22	Invercargill Invercargill	5 years 2 years	In the Waverly Hotel Tay St. Invercargill	1854		9 June 1865	B. Drake
274	10 June 1865	John Pasco Ellen Gloucester	John Pasco Ellen Gloucester 💍 1865/9439	Bachelor Spinster	Fisherman	34 20	Invercargill Invercargill	2 years 9 months	In the Catholic Church at Invercargill	1839		10 June 1865	M. Belliard
275	22 June 1865	Robert Henry Shanks Janet Reid	Robert Henry Shanks Janet Reid 💍 1865/9574	Bachelor Spinster	Runholder	34 25	Invercargill Invercargill	3 days 2 months	In the office of the Registrar Invercargill	1894		22 June 1865	John Hare

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).