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 477

District of Christchurch Quarter ending Oct - Dec

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
21136	7 October 1869	John Martin Rennie Louisa Round	John Martin Rennie Louisa Round 💍 1869/7683	Bachelor Spinster	Carpenter Servant	27 18	Cherry Road Do	7 years 4 years	In the Church of St Michael	1168	Eliza Round, father	7 October 1869	The Very Rev. Henry Jacobs
21137	7 October 1869	John McRay Jane Brown	John D McKay Jane Brown 💍 1869/7536 John Burgess Jane Brown 💍 1869/8181	Bachelor Spinster	Carpenter Servant	33 27	Christchurch Christchurch	1 month 3 years	In the House of Rev. C. Fraser	1115		7 October 1869	Rev. C. Fraser
21138	8 October 1869	James Reston Jane Russel Wilson	James Reston Jane Russel Wilson 💍 1869/7356	Bachelor Spinster	Clerk Dressmaker	22 23	Christchurch Do	3 years 6 years	In the Roman Catholic Chapel	1053		8 October 1869	Rev. Father Chervier
21139	9 October 1869	William George Chatfield Mary Leherry	William George Chatfield Mary Cherry 💍 1869/7869	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer Servant	30 22	Christchurch Christchurch	3 Days 3 days	In the Church of St. John	1230		9 October 1869	Rev. D. Bryen
21140	9 October 1869	Thomas Overend Sarah Reed	Thomas Overend Sarah Reid 💍 1869/7263	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer Servant	28 21	Courtenay Templeton	4 years 8 mths	In the Templeton Church	1022		9 October 1869	Rev. R. Jackson
21141	9 October 1869	Walter Goodland Emily Fantham	Walter Goodland Emily Fantham 💍 1869/7614	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	29 25	Papauni Do	3 years 8 years	In the Papauni Church	1143		9 October 1869	Rev. L. Moore
21142	9 October 1869	George Brunk Elizabeth Ann Burnett	George Brunt Elizabeth Susan Burnett 💍 1869/7539	Bachelor Spinster	Blacksmith Servant	22 17	Christchurch Do	3 Days 2 weeks	In the House of Rev. C. Fraser	1111	William Burnett, Father	9 October 1869	Rev. C. Fraser
21143	11 October 1869	Thomas Greement Catherine Nutty	Thomas Tolertin Catherine Bell 💍 1869/9618	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer Servant	34 25	Leeston Christchurch	4 years 4 mths	In the Roman Catholic Chapel	1131		11 October 1869	Rev. Father Chervier
21144	12 October 1869	Richard Glenning Ellen Power	Richard Fleming Ellen Power 💍 1869/7803	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	49 29	Christchurch Christchurch	3 Days 5 weeks	In the Lyttelton Ferry Road Church	1208		12 October 1869	Rev. J. Churchill

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).