Intentions to Marry, 1866

Reference: Registrar-General of Births, Deaths and Marriages, Notices of intention to marry, Series 8937, R2840378, Archives New Zealand Te Rua Mahara o te Kāwanatanga, Wellington

Page 325

District of River Grey 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
22	2 January 1866	Arthur Russet Jane Goudie	Arthur Russel Jane Goudie 💍 1866/8341	Bachelor Spinster	Publican Barmaid	31 21	Revell Street Hokitika	12 months 4 Months	Registrar's Office	1361		2 January 1866	Edward Patten
23	8 January 1866	Patrick Usher Pelley Mary Anne Lilley	Patrick Arthur Pilling Mary Ann McIver 💍 1866/8524	Bachelor Spinster	Surgeon Barmaid	24 21	Greymouth Hokitika	8 Months 4 Months	Spread Eagle Hotel	1433		8 January 1866	Rev. John Mc[UNCLEAR]
24	10 January 1866	Thomas Jolliff Francis Goodman		Bachelor Spinster	Publican	28 22	Greymouth Hokitika	6 Months 4 Months	Camp			10 January 1866	Rev. Cha Bowen
25	11 January 1866	John Aaron Goulding Mary Ann Smith	Charles Aaron Goulding Mary Jane Smith 💍 1866/8299 James Holmes Mary Ann Smith 💍 1866/9517 Thomas Newton Mary Ann Smith 💍 1866/8065 Thomas Englert Mary Ann Smith 💍 1866/8263	Bachelor Spinster	Storekeeper	28 16	Greymouth Gibbons Quay, Hokitika	10 Months 3 Months	Wesleyan Church	1353	Mary Ann Bradley, godmother & guardian	11 January 1866	Rev. G. S. Harper
26	13 January 1866	William Larke Catherine Laing	William Larke Catherine Laing 💍 1866/8302	Bachelor Spinster	Miner	35 35	Three Mile, near Hokitika Hokitika	6 Months 7 Months	Wesleyan Church	1354		13 January 1866	Rev. G. S. Harper
27	15 January 1866	James Dowell Maggie Tyre	James Powell Maggie Tyre 💍 1866/8491	Bachelor Spinster	Grocer	30 24	Revell Street Hokitika	9 Months 6 Months	Residence of John Whyte, Revell Street, Hokitika	1422		15 January 1866	Rev. B. Drake
28	19 January 1866	Alfred Gomes DeSilva Mary Ann Smith	Alfred Gomes de Silva Maria Anna Smith 💍 1866/8494 Thomas Newton Mary Ann Smith 💍 1866/8065 James Holmes Mary Ann Smith 💍 1866/9517 Thomas Englert Mary Ann Smith 💍 1866/8263	Bachelor Spinster	Storekeeper	35 22	Donoghues Flat, Stafford Greymouth	16 Months 11 Months	Henry Evans Arms, South Spit	1423		19 January 1866	Rev. B. Drake
29	20 January 1866	William Lokely Catherine Jones	William Larke Catherine Laing 💍 1866/8302 William Lovick Catherine Murphy 💍 1866/8488 William Cameron Catherine Fraer 💍 1866/10209 William Young Dennett Catherine Woods 💍 1866/6187 William Melvin Catherine Robertson 💍 1866/8776 William Aylward Catherine Hickey 💍 1866/5554	Bachelor Widow	Miner	47 32	Greymouth Hokitika	6 Months 4 Months	Wesleyan Church			20 January 1866	Rev. G. S. Harpes
30	22 January 1866	Patrick Burns Anastasia Money	Patrick Burns Anastatia Monoy 💍 1866/4339	Bachelor Spinster	Miner	33 22	Greymouth Greymouth	12 Months 5 Months	Catholic Church	1382		22 January 1866	Rev. Jo & Rogers

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).