Intentions to Marry, 1869

Reference: Registrar-General of Births, Deaths and Marriages, Notices of intention to marry, Series 8937, R2840381, Archives New Zealand Te Rua Mahara o te Kāwanatanga, Wellington

Page 169

District of Shortland Quarter ending Jan - Mar

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
7	30 January 1869	Robert Richard Walsh Eliza Jane Walsh	Robert Bigham Eliza Jane Walsh 💍 1869/3909	Miner Spinster	Miner	25 18	Graham's Town Graham's Town	11 Months 6 Months	Presbyterian Church, Shortland	348	William Walsh, Father	30 January 1869	Rev. James Hill
8	8 February 1869	John Joseph Windsor Sarah Savage	John Joseph Windsor Sarah Savage 💍 1869/5418	Bachelor Widow	Carpenter	22 26	Graham's Town Graham's Town	15 Months 11 Months	Roman Catholic Church Shortland	381		8 February 1869	Rev. Nivardo Sourdan
9	9 February 1869	Thomas Barnett Katherine Regan	Thomas Barnett Kate Condon 💍 1869/4230	Widower Spinster	Butcher	32 22	Shortland Shortland	6 Months 15 Months	Roman Catholic Church, Shortland	381		9 February 1869	Rev. Nivardo Sourdan
10	17 February 1869	James Hall Beatrice Matilda Houghton	James Wall Beatrice Matilda Hourigan 💍 1869/5421	Bachelor Spinster	Butcher	28 22	Shortland Shortland	8 Months 8 Months	Roman Catholic Church Shortland	382		17 February 1869	Rev. Nivardo Sourdan
11	18 February 1869	Gregor Mengblich Maria Short	Gregor Weuzlick Maria Shott 💍 1869/5424	Bachelor Spinster	Miner	28 21	Shortland New Plymouth, Auckland	18 Months 3 Years	Roman Catholic Church Shortland, Auckland	383		18 February 1869	Rev. Nivardo Sourdan
12	18 February 1869	Edward Dunnett Sarah Ann Lloyd	Edward Sweeney Sarah Ann Loyd 💍 1869/5325	Bachelor Spinster	Miner	24 19	Shortland Graham's Town	4 Months 3 days	Presbyterian Church Shortland	349	John Moore, Guardian	18 February 1869	Rev. James Hill
13	22 February 1869	Thomas French Jane Gerritt	Thomas French Jane Evritt 💍 1869/5301	Bachelor Widow	Miner	34 35	Graham's Town Graham's Town	16 Months 3 Months	Magistrate's Office, Shortland	339		22 February 1869	John Lambert Tole (Registrar)
14	1 March 1869	George Robert Beeson Hannah Minnis	George Robert Beeson Hannah Ninnis 💍 1869/5379	Bachelor Spinster	Boat Builder	23 20	Coromandel Graham's Town	11 Years 5 Months	Church of England, Coromandel	367	James Minnis, Father	1 March 1869	Rev. George Mannersell
15	23 March 1869	Philip John Birch Mary Smytheman	Philip John Birch Mary Smytheman 💍 1869/4344	Bachelor Spinster	Painter	21 19	Shortland Shortland	1 Month 7 Months	Wesleyan Chapel, Shortland	70	Richard Smytheman, Father	23 March 1869	Rev. J. S. Saunder
16	5 March 1869	William Noble Ann Rundle		Bachelor Widow	Bootmaker Dressmaker	39 26	Shortland Shortland	5 Months 5 Months	Church of England, Shortland			5 March 1869	Rev. V. Lush

These records have been automatically transcribed and must be verified using the page image (below)

100% Contrast

100% Brightness

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).