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 430

District of Christchurch 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
1357	March 10 1867	Richard May Hannah Palmer	Richard May Hannah Patmer 💍 1867/7210	Bachelor Spinster	Tailor	33 30	Ferry Road Ferry Road	3 days 3 years	In the church of St. John Evangelist	974		May 10 1867	Rev. G. Cholmondeley
1358	April 12 1867	Hugh William Hamilton Jane Redpath	Hugh William Hamilton Jane Redpath 💍 1867/7465	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer Servant	25 25	Christchurch Christchurch	Square 1 year	In the house of Mr. Hamilton	1061		April 12 1867	Rev. C. Fraser
1359	April 13 1867	Rees Griffiths Isabella Watson	Rees Griffiths Isabella Watson 💍 1867/7624	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	35 25	Christchurch Christchurch	6 years 3 years	In the house of the Rev.	1114		April 13 1867	Rev. G. Grant
1360	April 18 1867	McGregor Scott Agnes Zinna	McGregor Watt Agnes Hanna 💍 1867/7627	Bachelor Spinster	Store Keeper	30 25	Christchurch Christchurch	2 years 4 Days	In the house of the Rev.	1115		April 18 1867	Rev. G. Grant
1361	April 13 1867	George Ackerman Smith Elizabeth Munro	George Ackerman Smith Elizabeth Munro 💍 1867/7471	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	25 21	Christchurch Christchurch	2 weeks 1 year	In the Scotch Church	1063		April 15 1867	Rev. C. Fraser
1362	April 16 1867	George Missew Annie Gough	George Musson Annie Gough 💍 1867/7300	Bachelor Spinster	Farm Labourer Servant	21 21	Christchurch Christchurch	3 Days Smiths Christchurch	In the Roman Catholic Church Rangiora	1004		April 16 1867	Rev. Father Chataigner
1363	April 16 1867	John Bennett Kemmey Barrett	John Bennett Kemmey Barrett 💍 1867/7942	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer Domestic Servant	23 27	Ferry Road Ferry Road	4 days 4 days	In the house of Richard Bennett, Ferry Road	1224		April 16 1867	Rev. J. Thornton
1364	April 11 1867	John Edward Jacombs Sarah Wilkinson	John Edward Jacombs Sarah Wilkinson 💍 1867/7816	Bachelor Spinster	Stock	32 30	Christchurch Christchurch	2 year 1 mth	In the church of St. Michael	1181		April 16 1867	The Rev. G. Dean
1365	April 17 1867	Joseph Smith Mary Jane Frances	Joseph Smith Mary Jane Grainger 💍 1867/7468	Bachelor Spinster	Miner	25 16	Malvern Hills Malvern Hills	10 mths 4 years	In the house of the Rev.	1862	Edith Grainger, mother	April 17 1867	The Rev. C. Fraser

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 1898. More registers will be added when the Archives NZ Wellington reading room re-opens in September 2025.

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).