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 278

District of Wellington Quarter ending 30 September 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	Consent	Date of Certificate	Officiating Minister
81	4 July 1873	Jeremiah Harrington Caroline Mason	Jeremiah Harrington Caroline Mason 💍 1873/10114	Bachelor Spinster	Laborer Late Mason	23 16	Ohiro Ohiro	23 years 16 years	House of Mason, Ohiro	73/1806	A person in Ohiro, A.J. authorised	22 July 1873	Rev W. J. Peare
82	4 July 1873	William Fook Harriet Sophia Kemp	William Cook Harriet Sophia Kemp 💍 1873/10468	Bachelor Spinster	Draper R. Kemp	29 23	Johnsonville Wellington	4 years 8 years	Congregational Church, Wellington	73/1926		18 July 1873	Rev R. H. A. West
82a	9 July 1873	Frederick Walter Hodder Lydia Ann Mason	Frederick Walker Holder Lydia Ann Mason 💍 1873/10216	Bachelor Spinster	Carpenter d. Wm Mason	24 19	Wellington Wellington	18 months 19 years	St Paul's Church, Wellington	73/1840	Wm J. Mason, father	30 July 1873	Rev. B. W. Harvey
83	12 July 1873	Joseph Wyeth Phebe Ann Sunnex	Joseph Wyeth Phoebe Ann Sunnex 💍 1873/10189	Bachelor Spinster	Laborer d. Wm Sunnex	20 21	Upper Hutt Upper Hutt	20 years 21 years	House of Robt Clarke, Taita	73/1831	Robert Wyeth, father	21 July 1873	Rev J. B. Richardson
84	21 July 1873	Thomas Simmons Jane Gibson Cranston	Thomas Simmonds Janet Gibson Cranston 💍 1873/10324	Bachelor Spinster	Milkman Domestic Servant	27 22	Karori Road Wellington	14 years 5 years	House of C Simmonds, Tinakori Road	73/1876		1 August 1873	Rev J. Paterson
85	22 July 1873	Henry Alfred Herbert Ann Maria Becket	Henry Alfred Herbert Annie Maria Beckett 💍 1873/10222	Bachelor Spinster	Laborer Servant	25 22	Wellington Wellington	1 year 1 year	St Paul's Church, Thorndon	73/1841		5 August 1873	Rev. Ben Harvey
86	23 July 1873	John William Homan Bessie Corbett	John William Noman Bessie Corbett 💍 1873/10387	Bachelor Spinster	Carter d. Wm Corbett, Wellington	29 21	Wellington Wellington	4 years 8 years	Wesleyan Chapel, Manners Street	73/1898	Wm Corbett, Builder	6 August 1873	Rev. W. Morley
93	2 August 1873	John Emma	This is from page 279 which has been missed in scanning

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).