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 442

District of Christchurch Quarter ending Jul - Sep

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
1436	July 11	Thomas Hawkins Catherine Hawker	Thomas Plumridge Eliza Catherine Hawker 💍 1867/7855	Bachelor Spinster	Baker Milline	21 19	Addington Christchurch	12 years 2 years	In the Church	1195	Catherine Hawker, mother	July 11 1867	The Very Rev. the Dean
1437	July 11	William McKenzie Mercy Bardsley	William McKenzie Mercy Bardsley 💍 1867/7516	Widower Spinster	Tailor Servant	35 26	Christchurch Christchurch	18 mths 3 years	In the House	1078		July 11 1867	Rev. C. Frazer
1438	July 13	Frederick Allan Eliza Gilbert	Frederick Allen Eliza Gilbert 💍 1867/7519	Bachelor Spinster	Laborer Servant	24 21	Christchurch Christchurch	3 Days Do	In the House	1079		July 13 1867	Rev. C. Frazer
1439	July 16	James Pague Anne Burdett	James Payne Ann Burdett 💍 1867/7930	Widower Widow	Shoemaker	50 50	Papanui Papanui	3 years 3 years	In the Church	1220		July 16 1867	Rev. L. Moore
1440	July 16	George Lill Elizabeth Mushead	George Lill Elizabeth Muirhead 💍 1867/7894	Bachelor Spinster	Laborer Servant	28 24	Templeton Do	2 years 4 years	In the Church	1208		July 16 1867	Rev. R. Fendall
1441	July 17	George Briens Harriet Busby	George Brien Harriett Busby 💍 1867/8041	Widower Spinster	Servant	32 23	Christchurch Do	5 Days 4 mth	In the House	1259		July 17 1867	Rev. C. Frazer
1442	July 17	David Grant Margaret Webster	David Grant Margaret Webster 💍 1867/7648	Bachelor Spinster	Carpenter Servant	30 29	Christchurch Do	4 years 6 years	In the House of Mrs Webster Montreal Street	1123		July 17 1867	Rev. C. Frazer
1443	July 19	Godfrey Fruch Josephina Richards	Godfrey Finch Tryphena Richards 💍 1867/7522	Bachelor Spinster	Stockdriver	26 19	Christchurch Christchurch	3 weeks 1 month	In the House of the Rev. C Fraser	1080	John Dodd, Stepfather Christchurch	July 19 1867	Rev. C. Frazer
1444	July 22	Henry James Angers Mary Ellen Bailiff	Henry James Ainger Fanny Ellen Bailiff 💍 1867/7933	Bachelor Spinster	Clerk	28 29	Christchurch Do	3 years 3 years	In the Church	1221		August 12 1867	Rev. L. Moore

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).