Intentions to Marry, 1872

Reference: Registrar-General of Births, Deaths and Marriages, Notices of intention to marry, Series 8937, R2840384, Archives New Zealand Te Rua Mahara o te Kāwanatanga, Wellington

Page 223

District of Wellington 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	Consent	Date of Certificate	Officiating Minister
90	7 August 1872	Matthias Sefrief Mary Gallaghes		Bachelor Spinster	Mariner	35 24	Wellington Wellington	4 yrs 6 mo	Roman Catholic Cathedral Hill Street	1132		7 August 1872	Rev. M Cummins
91	7 August 1872	Donald Chisholm Sarah Elizabeth Overton	Donald Chisholm Sarah Elizabeth Overton 💍 1872/4821	Bachelor Spinster	Grocer Clerk Wellington	31 24	Wellington Wellington	7 yrs 11 mo	St Johns Tinakori Road	1075		9 August 1872	Rev. J Bean
92	15 August 1872	Richard Prouse Mary Jane Hebden	Richard Prouse Mary Jane Ebden 💍 1872/4911	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	20 21	Wainuiomata Wainuiomata	20 yrs 21 yrs	Wesleyan Chapel Wainuiomata	1093		17 August 1872	Rev G. S. Harper
93	21 August 1872	David Lewis Sophia Scott	David Lewis Sophia Scott 💍 1872/9278	Widower Widow	Commission Agent	68 50	Wellington Wellington	33 yrs 2 yrs	House of John Knowles Glenberrie Terrace	92/2584		21 August 1872	Rev J. Buddle
94	24 August 1872	John Harcourt Marritte Helen Wallace	John Harcourt Harriet Helen Wallace 💍 1872/5067	Bachelor Spinster	Salesman	24 20	Wellington Wellington	5 yrs 20 yrs	St Peters Church	1145	H. Wallace, father	27 August 1872	Ven. Archd Stock
95	26 August 1872	Thomas Themewar Elizabeth Allen	Thomas Tremewan Elizabeth Allen 💍 1872/5070	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	30 22	Taita Tawa Flat	4 yrs 22 yrs	Church of England Tawa Flat	1146		29 August 1872	Rev J. R. Tudor
96	31 August 1872	Edward Samuel James Fremantle Daniels Louisa Mansell	Edward Samuel James Fremantle Daniels Louisa Mansill 💍 1872/4830	Bachelor Spinster	Engineer	33 26	Wellington Wellington	18 yrs 4 yrs	House of Mr Mansell Arthur Street	1046		31 August 1872	Rev R. Wase

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).