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 554

District of Christchurch Quarter ending 31 March 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
3546	8 February 1875	William Boyce Buller Catherine Mills	William Boyce Buller Catherine Mills 💍 1875/1299	Bachelor Spinster	Accountant	27 22	Christchurch Christchurch	5 days 5 years	In the house of Mr. Mills, Timaru	75/1340		8 February 1875	Rev. I. Buller
3547	9 February 1875	John Furham Selina Say	John Durham Selina Day 💍 1875/1300	Bachelor Widow	Labourer	38 38	Ferry Road Ferry Road	5 years 3 years	In the house of Rev. C. Fraser	75/1341		9 February 1875	Rev. C. Fraser
3548	9 February 1875	Eli Paul Mitchell Harriet Thorsman	Eli Pain Mitchell Harriet Horsman 💍 1875/1298	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	36 27	Christchurch Christchurch	2 weeks 9 months	In the house of Rev. C. Fraser, Timaru	75/1339		9 February 1875	Rev. C. Fraser
3549	9 February 1875	Henry Woodham Margaret Mary More Regard	Henry Woodham Margaret Mary Moore Ryan 💍 1875/134	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer Servant	24 22	Christchurch Christchurch	12 years 6 years	In the house of Mr. Bell, St. Asaph Street	75/1139		9 February 1875	Rev. G. Bond
3550	9 February 1875	Henry Horsman Margaret Fawcett	Henry Norman Margaret Fawcett 💍 1875/213	Bachelor Spinster	Waiter Servant	24 25	Christchurch Waltham	4 years 7 years	St. Luke's Church, Christchurch	75/1224		9 February 1875	Rev. E. A. Lingard
3551	10 February 1875	George Lancaster Eurydice Eden	George Lancaster Eurydice Eden 💍 1875/204	Widower Spinster	Ballastman Servant	31 21	Christchurch Christchurch	5 years 18 months	In the Church of St. Michael, Christchurch	75/1233		10 February 1875	Rev. H. J. Edwards
3552	12 February 1875	Peter Brown Jane Hutchison	Peter Brown Jane Hutchison 💍 1875/1302	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer Servant	28 22	Christchurch Christchurch	7 days 2 weeks	In the house of Mr. Lyttelton, Lincoln Street	75/1343		12 February 1875	Rev. C. Fraser
3553	13 February 1875	Richard Perkins Elizabeth Steadfast Isle	Richard Perkins Elizabeth Steadfast Iles 💍 1875/220	Bachelor Spinster	Soda water Manufacturer Milliner	21 23	Christchurch Christchurch	13 years 23 years	St. Luke's Church	75/1224		27 February 1875	Rev. E. A. Lingard
3554	15 February 1875	John Scott Margaret Kenney	John Scott Tulloch Margaret Kenny 💍 1875/729 John Moore Margaret Kennelly 💍 1876/506 John Stewart Margaret Rennie 💍 1875/2093 John McRae Margaret McKenzie 💍 1875/2005 John Healy Margaret Kelly 💍 1875/554	Bachelor Spinster	Carpenter Teacher	30 26	Christchurch Christchurch	15 months 3 years	In the house of Rev. A. T. Douglas	75/1616		8 March 1875	Rev. A. T. Douglas
3555	15 February 1875	John Nelson Malla Anderson	John Nelson Malla Anderson 💍 1875/1170	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer Servant	28 20	Christchurch Christchurch	7 years 3 years	In the Church of St. John	75/1093	There is a person having authority to consent	15 March 1875	Rev. H. C. M. Watson
3556	17 February 1875	George Baltry Ellen Crocker Causby	George Daltry Ellen Croker Lawrey 💍 1875/598	Bachelor Spinster	Dairyman	22 21	Christchurch Christchurch	8 years 2 years	In the Wesleyan Church	75/123		8 March 1875	Rev. I. Buller

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).