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 449

District of Christchurch Quarter ending Oct - Dec

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
1491	October 1 1867	Joseph William Mason Mary Bridget Fitzpatrick	Joseph William Cox Bridget Fitzpatrick 💍 1867/7378	Bachelor Spinster	Station Manager	29 23	Mount Grey Christchurch	2 mile 3 Days	In the Roman Catholic Chapel	1030		October 12 1867	Rev. Father Chataigner
1492	October 1 1867	Charles Johnson Alice Whittington	Charles Johnson Alice Whittington 💍 1867/7726	Bachelor Spinster	Master Mariner	24 27	Ferry Road Christchurch	3 years 4 years	In the Church of St John	1064		October 12 1867	Rev. C. Bowen Hoare
1493	October 2 1867	Henry Potter Phoebe Mundy	Henry Patten Phoebe Mouldey 💍 1867/7126	Bachelor Spinster	Tailor	31 19	Christchurch Avonside	3 years 3 years	In the Church	945	Moses Mundy, Father	October 22 1867	Rev. J.B. Bagshaw
1494	October 2 1867	David Barrett Mary Ann Mouldey		Widower Spinster	Carpenter Dressmaker	28 24	Avonside Christchurch	1 week 3 years	In the Church	946		October 23 1867	Rev. J.B. Bagshaw
1495	October 5 1867	William Garrow Emily Rosa Matilda		Bachelor Spinster	Merchant	36 21	Christchurch Christchurch	1 year 3 mth	In the Wesleyan Chapel	959		October 15 1867	Rev. J. Buddle
1496	October 5 1867	Heber Newton Mary Jane Hillier	Heber Newton Mary Jane Hillier 💍 1867/7783	Bachelor Spinster	Clerk	24 30	Avonside Avonside	1 year 3 mths	In the House of Mr. Walkers	1168	Mother	October 28 1867	Rev. J.W. Walkers
1497	October 4 1867	William Douglas Carruthers Mary Hitchens	William Douglas Carruthers Mary Hickens 💍 1867/7123	Widower Spinster	Manager of the New Zealand Trust & Loan Company	46 32	Avonside Avonside	4 years 10 years	Avonside Church	944		October 4 1867	Rev. J.B. Bagshaw
1498	October 7 1867	James Spriggs Mary Hay	James Spriggs Mary Hay 💍 1867/7558	Widower Spinster	Farmer Housekeeper	34 35	Christchurch Christchurch	1 week 1 week	In the House	1092		October 7 1867	Rev. C. Fraser
1499	October 7 1867	George Sharp Harriet Ann Lee	George Sharp Harriet Anne Fox 💍 1867/7735	Bachelor Spinster	Plumber Servant	34 23	Christchurch Christchurch	2 weeks 2 years	In the Church of St John	1152		October 7 1867	Rev. C. Bowen Hoare

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).