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 422

District of Christchurch 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	Date of Certificate	Officiating Minister
1298	July 4 1867	Michael Fitzgibbon Ellen Murphy	Michael Fitzgibbon Ellen Murphy 💍 1867/7273	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	24 22	Prebbleton Christchurch	1 year 6 year	In the Roman Catholic Church	995	July 4 1867	Rev Father Chataigner
1299	July 5 1867	William Henry Highton Martha Walker	William Henry Ryghton Martha Walker 💍 1867/7903	Bachelor Spinster	Stock rider	27 21	Christchurch Christchurch	1 year 15 mos	In the church	1211	July 5 1867	Rev. H. Torlesse
1300	July 15 1867	George Low Beath Marie Malcolm		Bachelor Spinster	Draper	34 22	Christchurch Christchurch	1 year 13 mths	In the Church	1132	July 15 1867	Rev. C. B. M. Hoare
1301	July 9 1867	Edward Seary Wright Harriet Myra Roberts	Edward George Wright Harriet Myra Roberts 💍 1867/7678	Widower Spinster	Engineer	35 23	Christchurch Christchurch	4 years 2 years	In the Church	1133	July 9 1867	Rev. C. B. M. Hoare
1302	July 11 1867	Alexander Thigg Annie Grundy		Widower Spinster	Laborer	50 19	Christchurch Christchurch	1 week 3 years	In the house of Robert	1138	July 11 1867	Rev. - Habens
1303	Feby 12 1867	John Malley Honora Durn	John Malley Honora Dunn 💍 1867/7282	Bachelor Spinster	Laborer Servant	26 23	Christchurch Christchurch	4 years 3 years	In the Roman Catholic Church	998	Feby 12 1867	Rev Father Chataigner
1304	Feby 13 1867	Donald Collie Elizabeth Thank	Donald Collie Elizabeth Stuart 💍 1867/7414	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	33 33	Christchurch Christchurch	15 days 3 days	In the house of the Revd C. Frazer	1043	Feby 13 1867	Rev. C. Fraser D.D.
1305	Feby 16 1867	Thomas Faulder Louisa Haletta Pascoe	Thomas Faulder Dinah Isabella Plaskett 💍 1867/7795	Bachelor Spinster	Stock dealer	27 22	Christchurch Christchurch	2 years 3 years	In the church	1193	Feby 16 1867	Rev. H. Torlesse
1306	Jany 16 1867	George Beaumont Sarah Wilson	George Beaumont Sarah Wilson 💍 1867/7417 George Walton Isabella Wilson 💍 1867/4145	Bachelor Spinster	Shoemaker Servant	23 22	Christchurch Christchurch	6 years 3 years	In the house of the Rev C. Haden	1044	Jany 16 1867	Rev. C. Haden

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).