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 559

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	Consent	Date of Certificate	Officiating Minister
81	7 May 1868	Edward George Hill Catherine Murdoch	Edward George Hill Catherine Murdoch 💍 1868/10057	Bachelor Spinster	Ship Steward	23 18	Dunedin Dunedin	6 days 6 yrs	Manse of the Rev. Thomas Burns	1861	Catherine Murdoch, Mother	7 May 1868	Rev. Thomas Burns D.D.
82	11 May 1868	Alexander Mason Bridget Ford	Alexander Mason Bridget Ford 💍 1868/10417	Bachelor Spinster	Shoemaker	21 21	Dunedin Dunedin	3 days 3 days	Knox Church	1994		11 May 1868	Rev. D. M. Stuart
83	12 May 1868	Frederick William Barton Jane Merton Waugh	Fredk W Barton Jane Merton Waugh 💍 1868/10420	Bachelor Spinster	Grocer	22 18	Dunedin Dunedin	4 yrs 4 yrs	House of Robert Waugh, Leith Street	1995	Robert Waugh, Father	12 May 1868	Rev. D. M. Stuart
84	14 May 1868	John McLennan Euphemia Dass	John McLellan Euphemia Vass 💍 1868/8939	Bachelor Spinster	Messenger	33 22	Dunedin Dunedin	6 yrs 18 months	Manse of the Rev. R. Serymgeour	2098		14 May 1868	Rev. R. Serymgeour
85	15 May 1868	James Sly Annie Elizabeth Atkins		Widower Spinster	Storekeeper	50 29	Caversham Dunedin	4 yrs 1 month	Manse of the Rev. R. Connebee, View Street			15 May 1868	Rev. R. Connebee
86	18 May 1868	John Barruthers Bates Jane Harwood Ulph	John Carruthers Bates Jane Harewood Ulph 💍 1868/10423	Bachelor Spinster	Merchant	30 26	Dunedin Dunedin	6 yrs 2 yrs	House of Mr. Ulph, Heriot Row	1996		18 May 1868	Rev. D. M. Stuart
87	22 May 1868	Michael Deeny Mary Barr	Michael Feeny Mary Carr 💍 1868/10246 Michael Danaghy Mary Dunn 💍 1868/4619	Bachelor Spinster	Laborer	28 26	Dunedin Dunedin	1 week 5 months	St. Joseph Church	1931		22 May 1868	Rev. D. Moreau
88	25 May 1868	Edward Samuel Lees Charlotte Elizabeth Lees	Edward Samuel Lees Charlotte Lees 💍 1868/10189	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	30 21	Dunedin Dunedin	3 days 5 months	All Saints Church	1912		25 May 1868	Rev. G. Granger
89	28 May 1868	Thomas Brown Mary Young	Thomas Brown Mary Young 💍 1868/10315	Bachelor Spinster	Bellmonger	24 21	Green Island Green Island	8 yrs 5 months	Office of the Registrar of Marriages	1959		28 May 1868	Registrar of Marriages

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).