Intentions to Marry, 1868

Reference: Registrar-General of Births, Deaths and Marriages, Notices of intention to marry, Series 8937, R2840380, Archives New Zealand Te Rua Mahara o te Kāwanatanga, Wellington

Page 456

District of Quarter ending

No	Date of Notice	Names and Surnames of Parties	BDM Match	Condition	Calling or Profession	Age	Dwelling Place	Length of Residence	Marriage Place	Folio	Date of Certificate	Officiating Minister
1591	8 February 1868	George Shaw Annie Watkins	George Shaw Annie Watkins 💍 1868/6338	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer Servant	24 24	Christchurch Christchurch	2 years 18 months	In the Church of St. Michael	589	8 February 1868	Rev. W. J. Habens
1592	8 February 1868	Charles John Harper Sarah Cracroft		Widower Spinster	Shopkeeper	29 26	Lake Coleridge Cashmere	2 years 1 year	In the Halswell Church		8 February 1868	Rev. W. J. Blue
1593	10 February 1868	Edward Smith Hannah Gething	Edward Smith Hannah Gething 💍 1868/6335	Bachelor Spinster	Servant Servant	32 22	Ferry Road Ferry Road	4 Days 2 weeks	In the Church of St. Michael	580	10 February 1868	The Very Rev Dean
1594	14 February 1868	Dietrich Arps Elizabeth Smith	Joel James Harper Elizabeth Smith 💍 1868/6521	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer Servant	26 21	Papanui Papanui	2 years 10 years	In the House of Rev. C. Fraser	501	14 February 1868	The Rev. C. Fraser
1595	14 February 1868	John Griffith Elizabeth Hooper	John Griffiths Elizabeth Hooper 💍 1868/6305	Widower Spinster	Grocer	27 29	Christchurch Christchurch	2 years 1 year	In the Congregational Church	576	14 February 1868	The Rev. W. J. Habens
1596	14 February 1868	Charles Alfred Hewitt Selina Simmonds	Charles Alfred Hewitt Selina Simmons 💍 1868/6557	Bachelor Spinster	Baker Servant	23 22	Ferry road Ferry road	2 years 2 years	In the House of Rev. J. Thornton	665	14 February 1868	The Rev. J. Thornton
1597	15 February 1868	Mariano Simotich Julia Egan	Mariano Simtick Julia Egan 💍 1868/5945	Bachelor Spinster	Sailor Servant	30 25	Christchurch Christchurch	2 years 5 years	In the Roman Catholic Chapel	452	15 February 1868	Rev Father Chervier
1598	17 February 1868	James Strachan Barbara McLennan	James Strachan Barbara McLennan 💍 1868/6086	Bachelor Spinster	Contractor Servant	25 26	Christchurch Lincoln Road	7 weeks 4 months	In the House of Mr. Cook	500	17 February 1868	Rev C. Fraser
1599	19 February 1868	Frank Lowe Phile Emily Philips	Frank Lowe Phoebe Emily Phillips 💍 1868/5891	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer Nurse	22 22	St Albans Christchurch	1 week 5 months	In the Wesleyan Chapel	434	9 March 1868	Rev S H Buickeridge

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).