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 599

District of Dunedin Quarter ending Jan - Mar

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
17	17 January 1872	Archibald Lamb Jane Guickshank	Archibald Lamb Jane Cruickshank 💍 1872/6815	Widower Spinster	Carpenter Servant	45 25	Dunedin Dunedin	11 years 4 years	In the Manse of Rev. John Gow Dunedin	72/1737	7 February 1872	Rev. John Gow
18	18 January 1872	Charles Robert Brunton Marion Willis	Charles Robert Brunton Marian Willis 💍 1872/6851	Bachelor Spinster	Station Manager	25 31	Dunedin Dunedin	3 weeks 8 years	In All Saints Church Dunedin	72/1748	22 January 1872	Rev. E.H. Granger
19	19 January 1872	James Hill Mary Henry Davidson	James Hill Mary Harry Davidson 💍 1872/6812	Bachelor Spinster	Watchmaker	21 21	Dunedin Dunedin	3 days 7 years	In the House of Capt. Henry Canongate, Street Dunedin	72/1736	24 January 1872	Rev. John Gow
20	20 January 1872	Hugh Armour Elizabeth Allan	Hugh Armour Elizabeth Allan 💍 1872/9436	Bachelor Spinster	Shipwright Domestic Servant	37 27	Dunedin Dunedin	8 years 8 years	In the House of James Taylor, Esq. Herras York Place, Dunedin	72/1792	26 January 1872	Rev. A.M. Stuart
21	21 January 1872	Henry James Bacon Helen Wynnes	Henry James Bacon Helen Wymes 💍 1872/6938	Widower Spinster	Upholsterer	36 31	Portobello Portobello	12 months 12 months	In the House of Henry James Bacon Portobello	72/1778	30 January 1872	Rev. John Williams
22	22 January 1872	James Calcraft Margaret Isabella Ishkins	James Calcraft Margaret Isabella Jenkins 💍 1872/6770	Bachelor Spinster	Hotelkeeper	26 21	Dunedin Dunedin	4 years 4 days	In St Paul's Church Dunedin	72/1721	30 January 1872	Rev. E.G. Edwards
23	23 January 1872	Frederick Augustus Reeves Barbara McLean	Frederick Augustus Reeves Barbara McLean 💍 1872/4899	Bachelor Spinster	Storeman	36 23	Dunedin Dunedin	9 years 5 years	In the House of Samuel Ishkins Maitland Street Dunedin	72/1889	30 January 1872	Rev. George Sutherland
24	14 February 1872	James Johnston Sarah Thompson	James Johnston Sarah Thompson 💍 1872/4800	Bachelor Spinster	Butcher Domestic Servant	26 27	Dunedin Dunedin	3 days 3 days	In the Manse of Rev. George Sutherland Dunedin	72/1869	1 February 1872	Rev. George Sutherland

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).