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 539

District of Dunedin 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
163	July 1 1867	Thomas Morland Julia Annie Thinney	Thomas Morland Hooker Julia Annie Dakyne Simpson 💍 1867/8869	Bachelor Spinster	Drapers Assistant	31 25	Dunedin Goodwood	5 1/2 yrs 1 year	Wesleyan Church Dunedin	1545		July 1	Revd A. Parsons
164	July 4 1867	Gilbert Ruthven Isabella Mowat	Gilbert Ruthven Isabella Mowat 💍 1867/9583	Bachelor Spinster	Engineer	29 18	Dunedin Dunedin	4 yrs 3 yrs	In the house of James Mowat Cumberland Street	1788	James Mowat Father	July 4	Revd D. M. Stuart
165	July 5 1867	George Thomas Read Jessie Dunbar	Geo Thomas Read Jessie Dunbar 💍 1867/9589	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	35 21	Wakari Wakari	1 1/2 yrs 7 months	In the house of William Dunbar Wakari	1790		July 5	Revd D. M. Stuart
166	July 9 1867	Henry Timaru Rogers Maria Morris	George Henry Wynn Maria Morris 💍 1867/9586	Bachelor Spinster	Gun maker	29 20	Dunedin Dunedin	3 weeks 2 yrs	In the house of John Saunders Great King Street Dunedin	1789	No person to give Consent	July 9	Revd D. M. Stuart
167	July 9 1867	Charles Parker Elizabeth McPherson	Charles Fraser Elizabeth Sutherland 💍 1867/7399 Charles Dyke Elizabeth Hubbard 💍 1867/8854 Charles Dunfoy Elizabeth Davies 💍 1867/6469	Bachelor Spinster	Seaman	33 22	Dunedin Dunedin	4 days 2 yrs	In St Pauls Church Dunedin	1638		July 9	Revd E. G. Edwards
168	July 10 1867	John Oliver Eva Esther Vivian	John Oliver Evan Esther Vivian Bailhache 💍 1867/9205	Bachelor Spinster	Surveyor	25 23	Dunedin Dunedin	4 yrs 2 months	In the house of Thomas Melville Street Dunedin	1658		July 10	Rev. A. R. Fitchett
169	July 10 1867	James Thomas Caroline Prophet	James Thomas Caroline Prophet 💍 1867/9202	Bachelor Widow	Miner	35 27	Dunedin Dunedin	3 days 7 days	In the Wesleyan Church	1659		July 10	Rev. A. R. Fitchett
170	July 11 1867	John McLean Mary Ann Carman	John McQuin Mary Ann Hannah 💍 1867/9271 John Jenkins Mary Ann Rankin 💍 1867/10159 John McKellar Mary Pinkerton 💍 1867/9925	Bachelor Spinster	Laborer	28 22	Dunedin Dunedin	3 days 3 days	In St Josephs Church Dunedin	1682		July 11	Rev. L. Moreau
171	July 13 1867	James Cowan Margaret Pow	James Cowan Margaret Pow 💍 1867/9208	Bachelor Spinster	Carter	31 24	Dunedin Dunedin	2 yrs 3 yrs	In the house of Mr Pow George Street Dunedin	1694		July 13	Rev. A. R. Fitchett

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).