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 593

District of Christchurch Quarter ending Oct - Dec

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
3377	16 September 1874	Francis Belshaw Caroline Coucubs	Francis Belsham Caroline Coombs 💍 1874/11665	B W		21 25				1977		October 1874	Rev. C. Fraser
3378	17 September 1874	Thomas Pearte Alice Mary Payne	Thomas Peart Alice Mary Payne 💍 1874/11608	B		28 25				1957		October 1874	Rev. J. Suckling
3382	19 September 1874	Matthew James Donnelly Mary Cresswell	William James Donnelly Mary Cresswell 💍 1874/11668	B		27 19			Wesley Church	1978		October 1874	Rev. C. Fraser
3384	22 September 1874	Charles Hyde Fanny Gilling	Charles Hyde Fanny Gilling 💍 1874/13834	B		22 18				2676		October 1874	Rev. S. Macfarlane
3386	23 September 1874	Charles Bashford Amelia Ann Lawrence	Charles Bashford Amelia Ann Lawrence 💍 1874/13387			23 25				2726		October 1874	Rev. J. C. Matson
3389	26 September 1874	William Logan Anderson Charlotte Weir Geddes	William Logan Anderson Charlotte Weir Gemmel 💍 1874/14184			34 21				2570		October 1874	Rev. E. A. Lingard
3393	1 October 1874	Samuel Strait Jane Cooper	Samuel Wright Jane Cooper 💍 1874/12787	B S	Farmer Dressmaker	21 20	Ricearton Cambridge Terrace	21 years in the Province 19 years in the Province	Methodist Chapel	2366	Thomas Cooper, Father	October 1874	Rev. B. J. Westbrook
3394	2 October 1874	George Lavers Mary Ann Highway	George Lamb Mary Ann Higman 💍 1874/13384 George Yule Mary Ann King 💍 1875/482 George Cole Mary Ann Wild 💍 1874/10657	Bachelor Spinster	Constable	22 21	Christchurch Do	17 years in the Church of England 2 years Christchurch	St. Luke's Church	2568		October 1874	Rev. H. C. Watson
3395	2 October 1874	Robert [UNCLEAR] Rose Anna Crawford	Robert Jarmany Rose Anna Crawford 💍 1874/5833	Bachelor Spinster	Gamekeeper Servant	35 32	Christchurch Do	4 days in the house of 4 days Christchurch	Christchurch	1979		October 1874	Rev. C. Fraser
3396	5 October 1874	George Benjamin Fance Emily Freeman	George Benjamin Dance Emily Freeman 💍 1874/11590	Bachelor Spinster	Constable Servant	23 23	Christchurch Do	15 months in St. Mary's Church 4 years Addington	St. Mary's Church	1981		October 1874	Very Rev. Dean Jacobs
3397	5 October 1874	William Henry Fuller Elizabeth Martin	William Henry Fuller Elizabeth Martin 💍 1874/13897	Bachelor Spinster	Trainer	26 22	Ricearton Lincoln Road	8 years in the Riccarton Church 12 years		2748		October 1874	Rev. C. Bowen

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 1898. More registers will be added when the Archives NZ Wellington reading room re-opens in September 2025.

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).