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 601

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
3475	17 December 1874	William Peck Ann Elizabeth Bradbury	William Pratt Ann Eliza Bradbury 💍 1874/12556	Bachelor Widow	clothier housekeeper	48 38	Christehurch do	9 years 7 years	In the house of Mr Strange	2288		17 December 1874	Rev R. J. Haheus
3476	21 December 1874	William Swain Ellen Caroline Beighton	William Stuart Ellen Caroline Deighton 💍 1874/11566	Bachelor Widow	Architect	39 39	Christchurch do	2 years 5 years	St Michaels Church	1943		21 December 1874	Rev. H. B. Edwards
3477	21 December 1874	James Pallett Charlotte Suffer	James Patten Charlotte Duffell 💍 1875/596 James Scott Charlotte Stuart 💍 1874/8008	Bachelor Spinster	Carpenter Servant	22 21	Bings Land Papanui	15 months 10 days	do			21 December 1874
3478	21 December 1874	Daniel Gunn Jane Gray Wakefield	Daniel Gunn Jane Gray Wakefield 💍 1874/13852	Bachelor Spinster	Mariner Servant	24 19	Christchurch Christchurch	1 week 3 months	St Lukes Church Christchurch	74/2733	William Wakefield, father	21 December 1874	Rev A Lingard
3479	22 December 1874	Joseph Brlski Folio 74/174 Borlowski Dorothea Pokoriski	Joseph Breski Dorothea Sokoriski 💍 1875/95	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer Servant	30 28	Papanui Papanui	2 years 2 years	In the Roman Catholic Church Christchurch
3480	22 December 1874	John Rock Mary Kerowski	John Rock Mary Karomiska 💍 1875/103	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer Servant	21 20	Papanui Christchurch	3 months 2 years	The Roman Catholic Church		There is no person having authority to consent	22 December 1874
3481	22 December 1874	Joseph Debardieu Matilda Vizer	Joseph Seabourne Williams Matilda Vizer 💍 1875/221	Bachelor Spinster	Stationer	24 20	Christchurch Christchurch	18 months 10 years	St Michaels Church		Richard Vizer, father	22 December 1874
3482	23 December 1874	Robert Donald Gregory Jane Anderson	Robert Donald Gregory Jane Anderson 💍 1874/11734	Bachelor Spinster	Clerk Servant	22 23	Christchurch Christchurch	1 year 1 year	In the house of Rev C. Fraser Christchurch	74/2001		23 December 1874	Rev. C. Fraser
3483	23 December 1874	Charles Edward Illingworth Mary Magee	Charles Edward Illingworth Mary McGee 💍 1874/11761	Bachelor Spinster	Porter Servant	21 18	Colombo Road Springfield Road	1 year 6 months	Baptist Chapel	2010	There is no person having authority to consent	23 December 1874	Rev R. Morton
3484	24 December 1874	John Thomas Rogers Lorisa Harvey	John Thomas Rogers Louisa Harvey 💍 1874/11569	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer	30 19	Avonside Christchurch	6 months 8 months	St Michaels Church	1944	Thomas Harvey, father	24 December 1874	Rev H. B. Edwards
3485	24 December 1874	George Dorse Jane Brown	George Dowse Jane Brown 💍 1874/12757	Bachelor Spinster	Saddler	45 35	Christchurch do	3 days 3 days	Registrars Office	2356		24 December 1874	Registrar of Marriages

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).