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 676

District of Invercargill 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
365	2 July 1867	William Johnston Annie Malcolm	William Johnstone Annie Malcolm 💍 1867/10165	Bachelor Spinster	Engineer	23 19	Oterarnaka Gladstone	4 years 3 years	In the house of Francis Malcolm at Gladstone	1991	Francis Malcolm, Father	2 July 1867	A. H. Stobo
366	13 July 1867	Duncan Gillanders Mary Ann McBain	Duncan Gillanders Mary Ann McBain 💍 1867/10279	Bachelor Spinster	Shepherd	33 30	Invercargill Invercargill	7 days 10 days	In the Albion Hotel at Invercargill	1992		13 July 1867	A. H. Stobo
367	17 July 1867	Peter Blakie Janet Gray	Peter Blaikie Janet Wilson Gray 💍 1867/10201	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	27 23	Ryal Bush Waianiwa	6 years 2 years	In the house of James Gray Waianiwa	2005		17 July 1867	A. Nevens
368	11 July 1867	Patrick Bourke Mary Lee	Patrick Bourke Mary Lee 💍 1867/4255	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer	25 22	Invercargill Invercargill	4 years 7 days	In the Roman Catholic Church Invercargill	1965		16 July 1867	Henry Belliard
369	18 July 1867	Henry Duncan Mary McLean	Henry Duncan Mary McLean 💍 1867/10198	Bachelor Spinster	Blacksmith	24 19	Wallacetown Wallacetown	3 years 3 1/2 years	In the house of John McLean at Wallacetown	2004		18 July 1867	A. Nevens
370	23 July 1867	Michael Leonard Bridget Ford	Michael Leonard Bridget Forde 💍 1867/10093	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer Servant	25 23	Waikiwi Invercargill	5 years 4 years	In the Roman Catholic Church Invercargill	1966		23 July 1867	Henry Belliard
371	26 July 1867	Joseph Sykes Jessiah Limen	Joseph Sykes Jessiah Linner Calendar Gillespie 💍 1867/10168	Bachelor Spinster	Carpenter Dressmaker	24 22	Invercargill Invercargill	18 months 4 years	In the house of Christina Gillespie Invercargill	1993		26 July 1867	A. H. Stobo
372	26 July 1867	Michael Quinn Annie Cahill	Michael Quinn Annie Cahill 💍 1867/10096	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer Servant	25 22	Oterarnaka Invercargill	3 years 3 years	In the Roman Catholic Church Invercargill	1969		26 July 1867	Henry Belliard
373	23 August 1867	Angus McKay Isabella Helm	Angus McKay Isabella Helm 💍 1867/10132	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	32 26	Long Bush Roslin	8 years 2 years	In the house of John Helm at Grove Bush	1980		23 August 1867	John Alexander

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).