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 582

District of Dunedin 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
151	1 October 1869	George Chambers Ann Ross	George Chalmers Ann Ross 💍 1869/8550	Bachelor Spinster	Laborer	25 25	Dunedin Dunedin	2 weeks 2 weeks	Knox Church, Dunedin			1 October 1869	Rev. D M Stuart
152	4 October 1869	Thomas Peden Margaret Don	Thomas Peder Margaret Dow 💍 1869/8628 Thomas Cannon Margaret Woods 💍 1869/8883 Thomas Rowe Margaret Matheson 💍 1869/7563 Thomas Hogan Margaret Marooney 💍 1869/5298 Thomas Jenkins Margaret Steel 💍 1869/9441 Thomas Moyle Margaret Hopkins 💍 1869/5223 Thomas Hodgkinson Margaret Londen 💍 1869/6591 Thomas Landes Margaret Purcell 💍 1869/6627 Thomas Brass Margaret Smith 💍 1869/7764 Thomas Johns Margaret McIlroy 💍 1869/3901	Bachelor Spinster	Coachman	26 30	Dunedin Dunedin	3 yrs 4 yrs	The house of William Duncan, Roslyn	1491		4 October 1869	Rev. I Williams
153	4 October 1869	James Anderson Jane Brown	James Anderson Jane Brown 💍 1869/8286 Alexander Clyne Jane Brown 💍 1869/4848 John Burgess Jane Brown 💍 1869/8181	Bachelor Spinster	Baker	23 21	Dunedin Dunedin	14 yrs 8 months	The house of Miller Anderson, Heigh Street, Dunedin	1373		4 October 1869	Rev. G Sutherland
154	5 October 1869	Thomas Quilter Isabella Morgan	Thomas Quilter Isabella Morgan 💍 1869/8733	Bachelor Spinster	Miner	37 29	Dunedin Dunedin	3 days 6 weeks	St Joseph's Church, Dunedin	1529		5 October 1869	Rev. D Moreau
155	5 October 1869	Cor Ings Frances Marrielyally Coombes	Er Ings Frances Maria Lynee Coombs 💍 1869/8631	Bachelor Spinster	Gardener	26 20	Caversham Caversham	1 year 6 months	The house of Charles Coombes, Barrisbrook	1492	Robert William Lyall Coombes, Father	5 October 1869	Rev. I Williams
156	8 October 1869	Henry Miller Margaret Morrison	Henry Muller Margaret Morrison 💍 1869/8289	Bachelor Spinster	Carpenter	34 34	Dunedin Dunedin	2 1/2 yrs 3 1/2 yrs	The house of Mrs Chalmers, Roslyn	1374		8 October 1869	Rev. G Sutherland
157	11 October 1869	John Scott Lillias Jane Macfarlane	John Scott Lillias Jane McFarlane 💍 1869/8553	Bachelor Spinster	Shepherd	24 23	Dunedin Dunedin	3 days 2 yrs	In the house of Mr Bennett, Caversham	1466		11 October 1869	Rev. D M Stuart
158	11 October 1869	John Macfarlane Elizabeth Macbain	John MacFarlane Elizabeth Macbain 💍 1869/8583	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	41 39	Blueskin Blueskin	2 yrs 2 yrs	Knox Church	1496		11 October 1869	Rev. D M Stuart
159	13 October 1869	Owen Cameron Catherine Bain	Ewen Cameron Catherine Bain 💍 1869/9222	Bachelor Spinster	Hotel Keeper	35 19	Dunedin Blueskin	1 week 1 year	In the house of Duncan Bain, Blueskin	1495	Duncan Bain, Father	13 October 1869	Rev. Wm Johnstone

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).