Intentions to Marry, 1870

Reference: Registrar-General of Births, Deaths and Marriages, Notices of intention to marry, Series 8937, R2840382, Archives New Zealand Te Rua Mahara o te Kāwanatanga, Wellington

Imaged by Luke Howison at Archives NZ Wellington, November 15 2024

Page 541

District of Oamaru Quarter ending 30 September 1870

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
226	6 July 1870	Daniel McGregor Mary McFarlane	Daniel Macgregor Mary Macfarlane 💍 1870/8094	Bachelor Spinster	Ploughman	28 28	Identification Identification	1 year 18 months	The Manse			6 July 1870	Rev. A. B. Todd
227	18 July 1870	Henry Dawson Jane Elizabeth Gibson	Henry Dawson Jane Elizabeth Gibson 💍 1870/8148	Bachelor Spinster	Husb[UNCLEAR]	24 23	Oamaru Oamaru	27 days 8 days	St Luke's Church			18 July 1870	Rev. Algernon Gifford
228	26 July 1870	Jacob Shallard Anderson Martha Humphrey	Jacob Shallard Anderson Martha Humphrey 💍 1870/3927	Bachelor Spinster	HousePainter	39 36	Oamaru Oamaru	4 years 5 years	The Residence of Mr J. S. Anderson			26 July 1870	Rev. Algernon Gifford
229	24 July 1870	Robert Watson Sophia Baker	Robert Watson Sophia Baker 💍 1870/8097	Bachelor Spinster	Carpenter Dom Servant	29 31	Oamaru Oamaru	14 days 1 year	The Residence of Dr Webster			24 July 1870	Rev. A. B. Todd
230	15 August 1870	Frederic Collis Annale Williams	Frederick Collis Hannah Williams 💍 1870/8154	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	33 25	Fortification Oamaru	9 years 10 months
231	3 Sept 1870	Guy Bennett Ophelia Craig	Guy Bennett Ophelia Craig 💍 1870/8151	Widower Spinster	Hotelkeeper	42 19	Oamaru Oamaru	3 years 3 years	St Lukes Church	Oamaru	Craig Father	3 Sept 1870	Rev. Algernon Gifford
232	9 Sept 1870	Walter Allan Charlotte Paton	Walter Allan Charlotte Paton 💍 1870/8133	Widower Spinster	Labner Dom Servt	38 35	Oamaru Oamaru	4 Years 9 years	The Residence of George Orr			9 Sept 1870	William Lee
233	13 Sept 1870	John Clegg Mary Ann Cranford	John Clegg Mary Ann Crawford 💍 1870/8130	Bachelor Spinster	Carpenter Dom Servant	25 24	Oamaru Oamaru	2 years 16 months	The Residence of Mr John Clegg			13 Sept 1870	William Lee
234	29 Sept 1870	James Beattie Margaret Currie	James Beattie Margaret Currie 💍 1870/8103	Bachelor Spinster	Butcher Dom Servant	25 22	Jotara Jotara	4 years 2 years	The Manse			29 Sept 1870	Rev. A. B. Todd

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

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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).