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 480

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
223	9 October 1866	John Pope Elizabeth Amelia Wood	John Pope Elizabeth Amelia Wood 💍 1866/8680	Bachelor Spinster	Grocer	26 24	Dunedin Dunedin	3 yrs 3 yrs	In the house of Mr. Wood Moray Place Dunedin	1488		9 October 1866	Rev. J. Aldred
224	10 October 1866	John Morrison Margaret Sullivan	James Forrest Margaret Sullivan 💍 1866/4774	Bachelor Spinster	Carpenter	32 19	Dunedin Dunedin	3 days 5 months	In the house of Mr. W. D. Sutherland George Street Dunedin	719	No Person to give Consent	10 October 1866	Rev. D. M. Stuart
225	12 October 1866	Thomas Smith Emma Edwards	Thomas Smith Emma Edwards 💍 1866/8812	Bachelor Widow	Coach builder	27 26	Dunedin Dunedin	6 months 8 months	In the house of Emma Edwards Clark Street Dunedin	1533		12 October 1866	Rev. Thomas Burns D.D.
226	15 October 1866	John O'Regan Bridget McNamara	John O'Regan Bridget McNamarra 💍 1866/9106	Bachelor Spinster	Miner	28 21	Dunedin Dunedin	5 days 5 days	In St. Joseph's Church Dunedin	1634		15 October 1866	Rev. D. Moreau
227	15 October 1866	William Hankins Maria Jolly	William Hankins Maria Jolly 💍 1866/8815	Bachelor Widow	New Vendor	46 37	Dunedin Dunedin	5 yrs 2 yrs	In the house of William Hankins Filleul Street Dunedin	1534		15 October 1866	Rev. Thomas Burns
228	15 October 1866	Charles Barnes Shanks Agnes Bailey Campbell	Charles Barnes Shanks Agnes Baillie Campbell 💍 1866/8818	Bachelor Spinster	Surveyor	24 18	Dunedin Dunedin	2 weeks 15 yrs	In the house of Daniel Campbell London Street Dunedin	1535	Daniel Campbell Father	15 October 1866	Rev. Thomas Burns D.D.
229	16 October 1866	James Riccardo Stephens Theodocia Britton	James Ricardo Stephens Theodosia Britton 💍 1866/8941	Bachelor Spinster	Accountant	35 18	Dunedin Dunedin	32 yrs 3 days	In All Saints Church Dunedin	1577	Alexander Britton Father	16 October 1866	Rev. C. H. Granger
230	17 October [UNCLEAR]	Joseph Sykes Webb Mabel Wilhelmina Phillips	Joseph Sykes Webb Mabel Wilhelmina Phillips 💍 1866/8992	Widower Spinster	Accountant	34 22	Dunedin Dunedin	7 yrs 18 months	In the Office of the Registrar of Marriages Dunedin	1594		17 October [UNCLEAR]	Registrar of Marriages
231	18 October 1866	Alexander Allan Jessie Monteath	Alexander Allan Jessie Monteath 💍 1866/8821	Widower Spinster	Brickmaker	28 24	Dunedin Dunedin	4 yrs 3 yrs	In the house of Robert McDonald Stuart Street Dunedin	1536		18 October 1866	Rev. Thomas Burns D.D.

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).