Intentions to Marry, 1867

Reference: Registrar-General of Births, Deaths and Marriages, Notices of intention to marry, Series 8937, R2840379, Archives New Zealand Te Rua Mahara o te Kāwanatanga, Wellington

Page 223

District of Wellington Quarter ending Jan - Mar

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

January 2nd 1867

Francis Stevens
Lydia Emma Sladen

Francis Stevens
Lydia Emma Sladen
💍 1867/6031

widower
widow

Government Officer

full age
full age

Wellington
Wellington

nearly 2 years
6 mos.

St. Peters Church, Te Ara

574

January 2nd 1867

The Revd. A. Stock, B.A., and others

No	1
Date of Notice	January 2nd 1867
	Groom	Bride
Names of Parties	Francis Stevens	Lydia Emma Sladen
	💍 1867/6031
Condition	widower	widow
Profession	Government Officer
Age	full age	full age
Dwelling Place	Wellington	Wellington
Length of Residence	nearly 2 years	6 mos.
Marriage Place	St. Peters Church, Te Ara
Folio	574
Consent
Date of Certificate	January 2nd 1867
Officiating Minister	The Revd. A. Stock, B.A., and others

January 5th 1867

Henry Freer Rawson
Wilmot Elizabeth Borlase

Henry Freer Rawson
Wilmot Elizabeth Borlase
💍 1867/5962

Bachelor
Spinster

Dentist

28 years
16 years

Wellington
Wellington

6 months
about 10 years

St. Pauls Church, Thorndon

580

Chas Bonythorn Borlase, Father

January 5th 1867

The Rev. J. F. Herring Maxwell, M.A., and others

No	2
Date of Notice	January 5th 1867
	Groom	Bride
Names of Parties	Henry Freer Rawson	Wilmot Elizabeth Borlase
	💍 1867/5962
Condition	Bachelor	Spinster
Profession	Dentist
Age	28 years	16 years
Dwelling Place	Wellington	Wellington
Length of Residence	6 months	about 10 years
Marriage Place	St. Pauls Church, Thorndon
Folio	580
Consent	Chas Bonythorn Borlase, Father
Date of Certificate	January 5th 1867
Officiating Minister	The Rev. J. F. Herring Maxwell, M.A., and others

January 7th 1867

Rivers Hart
Catherine McLean

Robert Hart
Catherine MacLean
💍 1867/5923

Bachelor
Spinster

Solicitor

52
36

Wellington
Wellington

many years
five days

Church of Scotland, Lambton Quay

536

January 7th 1867

The Rev. J. S. Muir and others

No	3
Date of Notice	January 7th 1867
	Groom	Bride
Names of Parties	Rivers Hart	Catherine McLean
BDM Match (83%)	Robert Hart	Catherine MacLean
	💍 1867/5923
Condition	Bachelor	Spinster
Profession	Solicitor
Age	52	36
Dwelling Place	Wellington	Wellington
Length of Residence	many years	five days
Marriage Place	Church of Scotland, Lambton Quay
Folio	536
Consent
Date of Certificate	January 7th 1867
Officiating Minister	The Rev. J. S. Muir and others

January 10th 1867

Robert Riddick
Ellen Stratford

Robert Riddock
Ellen Stratford
💍 1867/6010

Bachelor
Spinster

Carpenter

28 years
22 years

Wellington
Hutt

4 years
many years

Residence of Mrs. John Stratford, Belmont, Hutt

569

January 11th 1867

The Rev. William McGowan and others

No	4
Date of Notice	January 10th 1867
	Groom	Bride
Names of Parties	Robert Riddick	Ellen Stratford
BDM Match (96%)	Robert Riddock	Ellen Stratford
	💍 1867/6010
Condition	Bachelor	Spinster
Profession	Carpenter
Age	28 years	22 years
Dwelling Place	Wellington	Hutt
Length of Residence	4 years	many years
Marriage Place	Residence of Mrs. John Stratford, Belmont, Hutt
Folio	569
Consent
Date of Certificate	January 11th 1867
Officiating Minister	The Rev. William McGowan and others

January 11th 1867

William Loft
Eliza Rodgers

William Loft
Eliza Rodgers
💍 1867/6022

Bachelor
Spinster

Mariner

40 years
30 years

Wellington
Wellington

2 years
do

Roman Catholic Cathedral, Thorndon

571

January 11th 1867

The Rev. J. B. Petitjean and others

No	5
Date of Notice	January 11th 1867
	Groom	Bride
Names of Parties	William Loft	Eliza Rodgers
	💍 1867/6022
Condition	Bachelor	Spinster
Profession	Mariner
Age	40 years	30 years
Dwelling Place	Wellington	Wellington
Length of Residence	2 years	do
Marriage Place	Roman Catholic Cathedral, Thorndon
Folio	571
Consent
Date of Certificate	January 11th 1867
Officiating Minister	The Rev. J. B. Petitjean and others

January 14th 1867

David Thomas
Ellen Love

David Thomas
Ellen Lowe
💍 1867/5935

Bachelor
Spinster

Mariner

32 years
24 years

Wellington
Wellington

6 years
8 months

Free Scotch Church, Willis Street

540

January 14th 1867

The Rev. John Moir and others

No	6
Date of Notice	January 14th 1867
	Groom	Bride
Names of Parties	David Thomas	Ellen Love
BDM Match (95%)	David Thomas	Ellen Lowe
	💍 1867/5935
Condition	Bachelor	Spinster
Profession	Mariner
Age	32 years	24 years
Dwelling Place	Wellington	Wellington
Length of Residence	6 years	8 months
Marriage Place	Free Scotch Church, Willis Street
Folio	540
Consent
Date of Certificate	January 14th 1867
Officiating Minister	The Rev. John Moir and others

January 23rd 1867

James Thomson
Agnes Bell

James Thomson
Agnes Bell
💍 1867/5887

Bachelor
Spinster

Surveyor

27 years
27 years

Wellington
Wellington

3 days
3 days

Residence of the Rev. John Moir, Wellington

524

January 23rd 1867

The Rev. John Moir and others

No	7
Date of Notice	January 23rd 1867
	Groom	Bride
Names of Parties	James Thomson	Agnes Bell
	💍 1867/5887
Condition	Bachelor	Spinster
Profession	Surveyor
Age	27 years	27 years
Dwelling Place	Wellington	Wellington
Length of Residence	3 days	3 days
Marriage Place	Residence of the Rev. John Moir, Wellington
Folio	524
Consent
Date of Certificate	January 23rd 1867
Officiating Minister	The Rev. John Moir and others

January 23rd 1867

Duncan Kennedy
Bridget McCarty

Duncan Kennedy
Bridget McCarty
💍 1867/6025

Bachelor
Spinster

Labourer

About 33 years
29 years

Wellington
Wellington

3 months
About 3 weeks

Roman Catholic Cathedral, Thorndon

572

January 23rd 1867

The Rev. J. B. Petitjean and others

No	8
Date of Notice	January 23rd 1867
	Groom	Bride
Names of Parties	Duncan Kennedy	Bridget McCarty
	💍 1867/6025
Condition	Bachelor	Spinster
Profession	Labourer
Age	About 33 years	29 years
Dwelling Place	Wellington	Wellington
Length of Residence	3 months	About 3 weeks
Marriage Place	Roman Catholic Cathedral, Thorndon
Folio	572
Consent
Date of Certificate	January 23rd 1867
Officiating Minister	The Rev. J. B. Petitjean and others

January 23rd 1867

Josiah Vile
Jane Bright

Josiah Vile
Jane Bright
💍 1867/5890

Bachelor
Spinster

Farmer

24 years
over 16 years

Maramajiwa
Wellington

3 days
3 weeks

House of Mr. Garner, Masterton, Wellington

525

Richard Bright, Father

January 23rd 1867

The Rev. John Moir and others

No	9
Date of Notice	January 23rd 1867
	Groom	Bride
Names of Parties	Josiah Vile	Jane Bright
	💍 1867/5890
Condition	Bachelor	Spinster
Profession	Farmer
Age	24 years	over 16 years
Dwelling Place	Maramajiwa	Wellington
Length of Residence	3 days	3 weeks
Marriage Place	House of Mr. Garner, Masterton, Wellington
Folio	525
Consent	Richard Bright, Father
Date of Certificate	January 23rd 1867
Officiating Minister	The Rev. John Moir and others

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 1903. More registers are being added almost every week.

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).