Intentions to Marry, 1875

Reference: Registrar-General of Births, Deaths and Marriages, Notices of intention to marry, Series 8937, R2840387, Archives New Zealand Te Rua Mahara o te Kāwanatanga, Wellington

Imaged by Luke at Archives NZ Wellington, May 16 2025.

This register is quite fragile and some of the pages are damaged or even missing.

Page 676

District of Oamaru Quarter ending 31 December 1875

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
449	4 November 1875	Alexander Grant Margaret Smalls	Alexander Grant Margaret Donald 💍 1875/2319 Alexander Grant Mary Honor Dawson 💍 1875/2691	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	30 31	Oamaru Oamaru	6 years 12 months	The Residence of Mr William Dawson in Ouse Street Oamaru	75/2479		4 November 1875	Rev. A. B. Todd
450	4 November 1875	James McFetrich Annie Kelly	James McFitrish Annie Kelly 💍 1875/2320	Bachelor Spinster	Engine-driver	27 21	Oamaru Oamaru	2 years 18 months	The Residence of Mr Kelly in Torridge Street Oamaru	75/2480		4 November 1875	Rev. A. B. Todd
451	23 November 1875	Alexander Riddell Margaret Richmond	Alexander Riddell Margaret Richmond 💍 1875/2321	Bachelor Spinster	Laborer Domestic Servant	21 18	Waiareka Oamaru	9 months 5 months	The Residence of Mr Boon - Immigration Cottage - Oamaru	75/2481	Margaret Law Boon Mother	23 November 1875	Rev. A. B. Todd
452	24 November 1875	John Logan Mary Grailish	John Logan Mary Jane Hewish 💍 1875/974	Widower Spinster	Boarding-house Keeper Domestic Servant	37 23	Oamaru Oamaru	9 years 3 years	St Patrick's Church Oamaru	75/2659		24 November 1875	Rev. Jeremiah Donovan
453	25 November 1875	Garret Roche Ellen Power	Garret Roche Ellen Power 💍 1875/2493 George Cann Ellen Power 💍 1875/1522	Bachelor Spinster	Laborer Domestic Servant	38 21	Waiareka Oamaru	9 years 2 years	St Patrick's Church Oamaru	75/2660		25 November 1875	Rev. Jeremiah Donovan
454	29 November 1875	James Mennie Faith Gibson	James Minnie Faith Gibson 💍 1875/2291	Bachelor Widow	Laborer	29 24	Oamaru Oamaru	5 years 5 years	The Residence of Mr Weir - Tees Street Oamaru	75/2483		29 November 1875	Rev. John Armitage
455	1 December 1875	Alexander Wilson Euphemia Walls	Alexander Wilson Euphemia Wills 💍 1875/2322	Bachelor Spinster	Laborer Domestic Servant	29 17	Oamaru Oamaru	3 years 3 months	The Residence of Mr Wilson - Tees Street - Oamaru	75/2482	Robert Walls Father	1 December 1875	Rev. A. B. Todd
456	1 December 1875	George Carrad Charlotte Bacon	George Carrad Charlotte Bacon 💍 1875/2325	Bachelor Spinster	Laborer Domestic Servant	20 17	Papakaio Oamaru	8 months 15 months	The Manse Oamaru	75/2483	Rebecca Burns Guardian of C. Bacon	1 December 1875	Rev. A. B. Todd
457	7 December 1875	Robert Paton Jane Smillie	Robert Paton Jane Smillie 💍 1875/3204	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer Domestic Servant	32 19	Papakaio Awamoko	7 years 9 years	The Residence of Mr William Smillie at Awamoko	75/3017	William Smillie Father	7 December 1875	Rev. John Stevens

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).