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 460

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
1627	24 March 1868	William Parsons Elizabeth Cooper	William Parsons Elizabeth Cooper 💍 1868/6350	Bachelor Spinster	Lawyer Servant	36 23	Christchurch Christchurch	2 weeks 3 mths	In the Church of St. Michael	593	24 March 1868	The Very Rev. Dean
1628	24 March 1868	Samuel Smelling Harriet Cameron	Samuel Snelling Harriet Cameron 💍 1868/6284	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	38 30	Prebbleton Christchurch	8 mths 5 years	In the House of Rev. G. Grant	568	24 March 1868	Rev. G. Grant
1629	23 March 1868	John Gerald Hannah Woods	John Fitzgerald Hannah Dobbs 💍 1868/5966	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer Servant	24 29	Christchurch do	1 mth 1 week	In the Roman Catholic Chapel	459	23 March 1868	Rev. Father Ch[UNCLEAR]
1630	25 March 1868	Jacob New Ladbrooke Elizabeth Milligan	Jacob Wenn Ladbrooke Elizabeth Milligen 💍 1868/6113	Widower Spinster	Farmer	48 32	Papanui Christchurch	2 years 2 weeks	In the House of Mr. Marley	509	25 March 1868	Rev. C. Fraser
1631	25 March 1868	George Hyde Sarah Kerwin	George Hyde Sarah Kirwan 💍 1868/6527	Bachelor Spinster	Bootmaker	21 24	Christchurch Do	15 mths 13 mth	In the Church of St. John	653
1632	25 March 1868	William Clark Ellen Gardines		Bachelor Spinster	Farmer Servant	27 23	Leeston Christchurch	10 mths 3 years	In the Scotch Church	575
1633	26 March 1868	Arthur Hopper James Richard Kitchingman	Arthur Hopper Emma Kitchingman 💍 1868/5894	Bachelor Spinster	Schoolmaster	28 19	Christchurch do	2 years 9 years	In the Wesleyan Chapel	435	26 March 1868	Rev. A. Reid
1634	26 March 1868	Otto Shrieger Alice Fletcher	Otto Krieger Alice Fletcher 💍 1868/6119	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer Servant	22 26	Springston Christchurch	9 years 5 years	In the House of Rev. C. Fraser	511	26 March 1868	Rev. C. Fraser
1635	27 March 1868	William White Mary Anne Pegrim	William White Mary Ann Peagram 💍 1868/6116 William White Mary McLaren 💍 1868/6581 William White Martha McGrath 💍 1868/5402	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	28 21	Coal Track Do	2 years 1 year	In the House of Rev. C. Fraser	570	27 March 1868	Rev. C. Fraser

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).