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 325

District of Nelson 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
27	1 April 1867	Frederick George Merritt Sarah Eves	Frederick George Merritt Sarah Eves 💍 1867/6694	Bachelor Spinster	Painter	23 20	City of Nelson South	8 years 20 years	at residence of Frederick George Merritt Trafalgar St. Nelson	799	William Eves, Father	15 April 1867	Rev. John Davis
28	2 April 1867	Henry Flower Ellen Anderson	Henry Flower Ellen Anderson 💍 1867/6769	Bachelor Spinster	Sawyer	26 19	Suburban North Suburban North	10 years 16 years	at the protestant Episcopalian Church Suburban north	847	Robert Anderson, Father	2 April 1867	Rev. George Henry Johnstone
29	8 April 1867	Richard Palmer Mary Ann Hill	Richard Palmer Mary Ann Hill 💍 1867/6853	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	20 22	Spring Grove Riwaka East	18 years 2 years	St Paul's Church Spring Grove	852	Elizabeth Hyde, mother	8 April 1867	Rev. Arthur Towgood
30	8 April 1867	Benjamin Lines Sarah Allcock	Benjamin Lines Sarah Allcock 💍 1867/6832	Widower Spinster	Sawyer	36 36	Wakefield Waimea East	24 years 2 years	at the residence of Thomas Lines Farmer Waimea East	845		8 April 1867	Rev. Edward Thomas
31	11 April 1867	Peter Martin Caroline Lambert	Peter Martin Caroline Lambert 💍 1867/6829	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer	25 22	City of Nelson City of Nelson	3 years 2 weeks	at the residence of Thomas Martin Rising Sun Tavern Waimea Road	844		11 April 1867	Rev. Edward Thomas
32	12 April 1867	William Biggar Mary Ann Best	William Biggar Mary Ann Best 💍 1867/6595	Bachelor Spinster	Inn manager	25 19	Stoke Stoke	5 years 19 years	at the Presbyterian Church in Nelson	764	Job Best, Father	12 April 1867	Rev. Patrick Calder
33	15 April 1867	William Atkins Sarah Anne Staples	William Atkins Sarah Ann Staples 💍 1867/6664	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	22 20	City of Nelson	2 years 4 days	at the Wesleyan Chapel Hardy St. Nelson	781	consent given at Matakitaki	15 April 1867	Rev. John Crump
34	15 April 1867	Denis Conway Hurley Jane Cate	Denis Courvay Hurley Jane Cate 💍 1867/6724	Bachelor Spinster	Cutter	26 22	City of Nelson City of Nelson	6 years 22 years	at the Catholic Church Nelson	809		18 April 1867	Rev. Aus. Marie Garin
35	22 April 1867	Louis Albert Kiesig Hannah Bomforth	Louis Albert Elerig Hannah Bomforth 💍 1867/6601	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer	23 21	City of Nelson City of Nelson	1 week 21 years	at the residence of Elijah Fuller Brook Street	766		22 April 1867	Rev. Patrick Calder
36	24 April 1867	James Fieldes Laura Moore	James Fieldes Laura Moore 💍 1867/6835	Bachelor Spinster	Carpenter	23 23	City of Nelson City of Nelson	23 years 3 years	at the residence Manuka St. Nelson	846		24 April 1867	Rev. Edward Thomas
37	25 April 1867	Charles Beaver Mary Tennington	Charles Beaver Mary Pennington 💍 1867/6775	Bachelor Spinster	Gardener	27 22	Nelson City Nelson City	1 year 1 year	at Christ Church Nelson	826		24 April 1867	Rev. George Henry Johnstone

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).