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 345

District of Nelson 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	Date of Certificate	Officiating Minister
44	5 July 1869	William Henry Jones Elizabeth Diamond	William Henry Jones Elizabeth Diamond 💍 1869/6561	Bachelor Spinster	Cabinetmaker	24 21	Waimea West City of Nelson	1 year 1 week	Christchurch Nelson	779	20 July 1869	Rev. George Henry Johnstone
45	6 July 1869	George Atherton Julia Elizabeth Bass	George Atherton Julia Elizabeth Bass 💍 1869/6447	Bachelor Spinster	Publican	26 22	City of Nelson City of Nelson	3 months 6 months	Wesleyan Parsonage Nelson	740	6 July 1869	Rev. John Crump
46	22 July 1869	John Nelson Newth Mary Jane Patt		Bachelor Spinster	Carter	23 23	Spring Grove Spring Grove	4 years 20 years	Residence of William Ratt, Farmer, Spring Grove	796	22 July 1869	Rev. James A. Taylor
47	11 August 1869	George Naylor Louisa Darby	George Naylor Louisa Darby 💍 1869/6543	Bachelor Spinster	Clerk	36 21	City of Nelson City of Nelson	4 years 10 years	All Saints Church Nelson	773	11 August 1869	Rev. Rich. Joshua Thorpe
48	14 August 1869	William Doidge Elizabeth Coles	William Doidge Elizabeth Coles 💍 1869/6453	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer	26 24	Stoke Stoke	8 years 5 years	Residence of John Tipper Smith, Schoolmaster, Stoke	742	14 August 1869	Rev. John Crump
49	18 August 1869	Jesse Redwood Ann Leary	Jesse Redwood Anne Leary 💍 1869/6471	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	36 34	Waimea West Waimea West	12 years 5 years	Catholic Church Nelson	748	18 August 1869	Rev. Antoine Marie Garin
50	19 August 1869	Henry Edward West Emily Harrison	Henry Edward Nest Emily Harrison 💍 1869/6540	Bachelor Spinster	Stockman	24 25	City of Nelson City of Nelson	12 days 2 years	All Saints Church Nelson	772	19 August 1869	Rev. Rich. Joshua Thorpe
51	27 August 1869	Henry Newport Ann Giles Hubbard	Henry Newport Ann Giles Hubbard 💍 1869/6456	Bachelor Spinster	Gardener	26 22	City of Nelson City of Nelson	3 years 9 years	Residence of William Hubbard, Cabinetmaker, Trafalgar St. Nelson	743	27 August 1869	Rev. John Crump
52	16 September 1869	William Thomas Styles Lydia Christison	William Thos Styles Lydia Christison 💍 1869/6459	Bachelor Spinster	Painter	30 23	City of Nelson City of Nelson	2 years 10 years	Residence of Israel Pickard, Dealer, Emanu St. Nelson	744
53	22 September 1869	David Robertson Catherine Douthin	David Robertson Catharine Donkin 💍 1869/6489 Donald Robertson Catherine Robertson 💍 1869/9510 David Robertson Margaret Matheson 💍 1869/8229	Bachelor Widow	Stone mason	42 43	City of Nelson City of Nelson	4 years 9 years	Residence of Catherine Douthin, Widow, Hardy St. Nelson	754	22 September 1869	Rev. Patrick Calder

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).