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 582

District of Christchurch 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
3292	8 July 1874	Joseph Cottrell Clara Constance Ferrars	Joseph Cottrell Clara Constance Ferrar 💍 1874/11332	Bachelor Spinster	Clerk	28 23	Christelunch do	3 years 2 years	In the house of mrs S. Ferris	1862		8 July 1874	Rev D Glasson
3293	9 July 1874	Thomas Hills Susan Moody	Thomas Hill Julia Moody 💍 1874/10855	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer Servant	25 21	Christchurch do	10 days 12 days	In St Michaels Church	1699		9 July 1874	Rev W S Edwards
3294	10 July 1874	Hugh Donaldson Elizabeth Chesson	Hugh Donaldson Elizabeth McGregor 💍 1874/9214	Bachelor Spinster	Carrier	33 23	Christchurch do	3 days 2 years	Christchurch	1134		10 July 1874	Rev C F Douglas
3295	13 July 1874	Vicent Kidd Annie Kitchen	Nicol Kidd Annie Kitchen 💍 1874/8467	Bachelor Spinster	Saddler Servant	24 26	Christchurch Christchurch	1 week 2 years	Christchurch	886		13 July 1874	Rev C F Douglas
3296	14 July 1874	Edward Wakefield Agnes Muldrew	Edward Wakefield Agnes Mildred Hall 💍 1874/10858	Bachelor Spinster	Journalist	29 23	Christchurch do	4 days 5 years	St Michaels Church	1700		14 July 1874	Rev H Glasson
3297	14 July 1874	Samuel Berry Maddison Harriet Cusdin	Samuel George Maddison Harriet Cusdin 💍 1874/9655	Bachelor Spinster	Confectioner	21 21	Christchurch do	8 years 10 years	Christchurch	1290		14 July 1874	Rev H Glasson
3298	15 July 1874	Frank Pavek Mary Break	Frank Panal Mary Beal 💍 1874/11335	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer Servant	28 26	Christchurch do	4 days 9 years	Church	1863		15 July 1874	Rev C Harris
3299	16 July 1874	Jacob Karabus Mary Ann Gundy	Jacob Karalus Mary Ann Gundy 💍 1874/11017	Bachelor Spinster	Mariner	37 19	Christchurch do	3 days 3 days	In the Baptist Chapel	1754	John Gundy, father	16 July 1874	Rev R Twenton
3300	16 July 1874	William Melbourne Susan Collins	William Melbourne Susan Collins 💍 1874/11338	Widower Bachelor	Farmer	34 17	North Road North Road	6 years 1 year	In the house of Rev C Fraser Christchurch	74/1864	William Collius, father	16 July 1874	Rev C Fraser
3301	17 July 1874	John Charles Bell Phoebe Sarah Jaylon	John Charles Bell Phoebe Sara Taylor 💍 1874/9892	Bachelor Spinster	Surveyor	31 22	Christchurch do	1 year 15 years	In the house of T.R. Jaylon	1369		17 July 1874	Rev J Knowles
3302	18 July 1874	Charles Cole Mary Ann Harvey	Charles Cole Mary Ann Harvey 💍 1874/10987	Widower Spinster	Farmer Servant	39 34	Papauni do	7 years 2 weeks	Christchurch	1742		18 July 1874	The Registrar of Marriages (Mr Paterson)

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).