Intentions to Marry, 1874

Reference: Registrar-General of Births, Deaths and Marriages, Notices of intention to marry, Series 8937, R2840386, Archives New Zealand Te Rua Mahara o te Kāwanatanga, Wellington

Page 571

District of Christchurch Quarter ending Apr - Jun

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
3174	3 January 1874	Daniel Jemmett Elizabeth Allen	"Certificate not called for"
3175	28 March 1874	Stephen William Mitchell Celia Anna Northey	Stephen William Mitchell Celia Anna Northey 💍 1874/9040			21 21				1308		7 April 1874	Rev. S.A. Linjard
3181	28 March 1874	John Gunter Johanna Allingham	John Gunter Johanna Allingham 💍 1874/11179			28 21				74/1808		13 April 1874	Rev. C. Fraser
3185	30 March 1874	Edward Denham Emily Nalder	Edward Denham Emily Nalder 💍 1874/9043			39 34				74/1079		13 April 1874	Rev. A. Lingard
3187	2 April 1874	Edward Bench Emily Jones	Edward Genet Emily Jones 💍 1874/11212	Bachelor Spinster	Millard Twanker	29 20	Christchurch Do	14 years 1 year	In the house of Rev. C. Fraser	74/350	There is no person having authority to forbid.	15 April 1874	Rev. C. Fraser
3188	4 April 1874	George Lui Elias August Conrad Christian Klingenstein Sarah Ann Oram	George Lui August Conrad Christian Klingenstein Sarah Ann Oram 💍 1874/7894	Bachelor Spinster	Hotel Keeper	29 25	Ashburton Christchurch	5 months 3 weeks	In St. Michaels Church Christchurch	74/687		4 April 1874	Revd H J Edwards
3189	5 April 1874	Richard James Peace Catherine Smith	Richard James Pearce Catherine Smith 💍 1874/6919	Widower Spinster	Painter	45 30	Christchurch Do	10 years 6 years	In the Baptist Chapel	74/695		6 April 1874	Rev. R. Thornton
3190	6 April 1874	Richard Hight Catherine Irwin	Richard Hight Catherine Unwin 💍 1874/7918	Widower Widow	Farmer	41 41	Rolleston Do	6 years 5 years	In the Wesleyan Chapel	74/695		7 April 1874	Rev. S. Ironside
3191	9 April 1874	Henry Beckett Joanna Clarke	Henry Beckett Joanna Clarke 💍 1874/7912	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer Servant	24 25	Christchurch Do	3 days 2 months	In Addington Church	74/693		9 April 1874	Rev. J. Raven
3192	9 April 1874	William Taylor Margaret Griffiths	William Taylor Margaret Griffiths 💍 1874/13237	Bachelor Spinster	Printer Servant	32 22	Christchurch Do	11 years 2 years	In the Church of St. John	3519		9 April 1874	Rev. H.C.M. Watson
3193	10 April 1874	James Anderson Wilson Emily Mary Harwood	James Anderson Wilson Emily Mary Harwood 💍 1874/9196	Bachelor Spinster	Smith	23 19	Christchurch Prebbleton	1 year 1 month	In Prebbleton Church	74/130	Samuel Harwood, father	15 April 1874	Rev. W.S. Page

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).