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 566

District of Christchurch Quarter ending 30 June 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
3674	10 May 1875	Alfred Shaw Ann Maguire	Alfred Shaw Anne Maguire 💍 1875/1179	Bachelor Spinster	Cabinet Maker Servant	21 21	Christchurch Christchurch	2 months 10 months	St. Johns Church	75/1101		10 May 1875	Rev. H. L. Watson
3675	11 May 1875	George Nathaniel Sayers Sarah Elizabeth Wickes	George Nathaniel Sayers Sarah Elizabeth Wickes 💍 1875/1258	Bachelor Spinster	Painter	22 21	Christchurch Christchurch	9 months 9 months	The Congregational Church Christchurch	75/1323		11 May 1875	Rev. W. G. Habens
3676	11 May 1875	John Johnson Mary Worthing	John Johnson Mary Norton 💍 1875/1158	Bachelor Spinster	Shoemaker Servant	24 20	Christchurch Christchurch	3 years 2 years	The House	75/1007	There is representation giving authority to Consult	11 May 1875	Rev. I. Butler
3677	11 May 1875	Samuell Love Sarah O'Neill	Samuel Love Sarah O'Neil 💍 1875/3057	Bachelor Spinster	Labour Servant	30 23	Christchurch Christchurch	3 years 5 years	The House	75/1413		11 May 1875	Rev. C. Fraser
3678	11 May 1875	Michael Hagin Mary Rhine	Michael Hagin Mary Rhine 💍 1875/957	Bachelor Spinster	Labour Servant	22 21	Christchurch Christchurch	9 months 9 months	The Roman Catholic Church Christchurch	75/999		11 May 1875	Rev. H. Hallard
3679	11 May 1875	Thomas Codling Elizabeth Ball	Thomas Codling Elizabeth Button 💍 1875/1059	Bachelor Spinster	Carpenter Dressmaker	23 22	St. Albans St. Albans	17 years 6 months	The Wesleyan Church	75/1104		11 May 1875	Rev. I. Butler
3680	12 May 1875	Robert Walsh Elizabeth Jane Ible	Robert George Elizabeth Jones 💍 1876/351 Robert Dixon Elizabeth Wakeford 💍 1875/2237 Robert Gunn Elizabeth Wallace 💍 1875/355	Bachelor Spinster	Labour Servant	22 21	Christchurch Christchurch	6 days 6 days	The House	75/1408		12 May 1875	Rev. C. Fraser
3681	12 May 1875	Joseph Catchpole Margaret McCardell	Joseph Catchpole Margaret McCardell 💍 1875/952	Bachelor Spinster	Publican Servant	24 19	Christchurch Christchurch	1 year 6 months	St. Michaels Church	75/995	There is no person having authority to consent	12 May 1875	Rev. St. J. Edwards
3682	12 May 1875	John Curtis Caroline Hood	John Curtis Caroline Hood 💍 1875/1049	Bachelor Spinster	Accountant	37 30	Christchurch Christchurch	2 years 6 months	St. Lukes Church	75/1120		12 May 1875	Rev. E. A. Lingard
3683	18 May 1875	George Hawker Mary Hall	George Hawkes Whitcombe Mary Hall 💍 1875/1048 Keren Devery Mary Hall 💍 1875/1671	Bachelor Spinster	Clerk	22 22	Christchurch Christchurch	3 days 6 years	St. Lukes Church	75/1119		18 May 1875	Rev. E. A. Lingard
3684	18 May 1875	Joseph Adams Jane Rea	Joseph Adams Jane Red 💍 1875/674	Bachelor Spinster	Servant Servant	25 21	Rakaia Rakaia	6 years 1 year	The House	75/801	W. Adams	18 May 1875	Rev. P. H. Gould

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).