Intentions to Marry, 1873

Reference: Registrar-General of Births, Deaths and Marriages, Notices of intention to marry, Series 8937, R2840385, Archives New Zealand Te Rua Mahara o te Kāwanatanga, Wellington

Imaged by Luke Howison at Archives NZ Wellington, December 4 2024

Page 730

District of Dunedin Quarter ending 31 March 1873

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
64	15 March 1873	George Mitchell Jane Rutherford	George Mitchell Jane Rutherford 💍 1873/6175	Bachelor Spinster	Grocer	23 22	Dunedin Carisham	5 years 4 years	In the house of Robert Rutherford	M73/461	18 March 1873	Rev. D. Hopland
65	16 March 1873	Thomas Short Isabella Short	Thomas Short Isabella Purvis Short 💍 1873/6178	Bachelor Spinster	Carpenter	30 22	Dunedin North East Valley	6 years 2 years	In the house of Robert Short	M73/462	18 March 1873	Rev. D. Hopland
66	22 March 1873	Alfred Gautier Mary Ann Uttley	Alfred Gautier Mary Ann Uttley 💍 1873/6166	Bachelor Spinster	Seaman Housekeeper	28 27	Dunedin Dunedin	1 month 3 months	In the office of The Registrar of Marriages	M73/458	22 March 1873	The Registrar of Marriages, Dunedin
67	24 March 1873	Peter Clemic Mary Vyle	Peter Clunie Mary Kyle 💍 1873/6235	Bachelor Spinster	Baker	26 23	Dunedin Dunedin	3 days 5 years	Knox Church	M73/481	24 March 1873	Rev. D. M. Stuart D.D.
68	26 March 1873	George Park Christina Dallas	George Park Christina Dallas 💍 1873/8653	Bachelor Spinster	Hawker	24 22	Dunedin Dunedin	4 years 3 years	In the house of James Miller	73/302	26 March 1873
70	26 March 1873	Alfred Frederick Smyth Austin Eliza Mitchell	Alfred Frederick Smyth Austin Eliza Mitchel 💍 1873/6244	Bachelor Spinster	Pedestrian Milliner	22 18	Dunedin Dunedin	2 months 18 years	In the house of Wm. Wheeler	M73/484	26 March 1873	Rev. D. M. Stuart D.D.
71	27 March 1873	John Murdoch Harriet Croft	John Murdoch Harriet Croft 💍 1873/6238	Bachelor Spinster	Carrier	24 22	Dunedin Dunedin	3 days 11 years	In the home of John Murdoch	M73/482	27 March 1873	Rev. D. M. Stuart D.D.
72	28 March 1873	John Reid Eliza Pratt	John Reid Eliza Pratt 💍 1873/6241	Bachelor Spinster	Saddler Servant	27 22	Dunedin Dunedin	3 days 3 years	Knox Church	M73/483	28 March 1873	Rev. D. M. Stuart D.D.

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).