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 300

District of Wellington 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
212	5 October 1875	Johan Oskar Carlsson Laura Johanna Maria Dorothea Hansen	Johan Oskar Carlson Laura Margaretta Juliana Jansen 💍 1875/2337	Bachelor Spinster	Carpenter	25 15	Wellington Wellington	4 yrs 8 months	Syrs House of Johan Oskar Carlsson, Nairn Street, Wellington	75/2427	Lars Hansen, Father	5 October 1875	Rev. Mr. Morley
213	8 October 1875	Frank Anderson Harriet Fisher	Frank Anderson Harriet Fisher 💍 1875/2122	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer Domestic Servant	21 17	Porirua Porirua	12 months 12 months	House of James Paterson, The Terrace, Wellington	75/2429	Compliment Fisher, Father	8 October 1875	Rev. J. Paterson
214	8 October 1875	George Mills Elizabeth Southee	George Mills Elizabeth Southee 💍 1875/2120	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer	29 19	Stokes Valley Stokes Valley	6 months 6 years	House of George Southee, Stokes Valley	75/2275	Consent of Father of G. Southee	8 October 1875	Rev. J. B. Richardson
215	9 October 1875	William Collis Frances Woodward	William Collis Frances Woodward 💍 1875/2592	Bachelor Widow	Farmer Domestic Servant	21 26	Waimiomana Waimiomana	16 years 5 weeks	Registrars Office, Wellington	75/2429		9 October 1875	Registrar of Marriages, Wellington
216	9 October 1875	John Prouse Helen Harding	John Prouse Helen Harding 💍 1875/2126	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer Governess	21 21	Waimiomana Waimiomana	21 yrs 16 months	Church of St Peters, Te Aro	75/2281	Double Archd. Stock	9 October 1875	Double Archd. Stock
217	12 October 1875	Henry Gorow Caroline Woodroffe	Henry Town Caroline Woodrofe 💍 1875/2251	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer	21 18	Telha Street Telha Street	8 months 8 months	Church of England, Upper Hutt	75/2309	George Woodroffe, Father, C. H. Nicholls	12 October 1875	C. H. Nicholls
218	12 October 1875	Horatio Hill Matilda Cooke		Bachelor Spinster	Painter Domestic Servant	25 25	Wellington Wellington	9 months 10 months	St Paul's Cathedral, Mulgrave Street	75/2310		12 October 1875	Rev. B. W. Harvey
219	12 October 1875	William Hamilton Mary Bailey	William Hamilton May Bailey 💍 1875/2344 Thomas Bailey Mary Bailey 💍 1876/194	Bachelor Spinster		24 22	Wellington Wellington	5 days 5 days	Wesleyan Church, Manners Street, Wellington	75/2428		12 October 1875	Rev. Mr. Morley

These records have been automatically transcribed and must be verified using the page image (below)

100% Contrast

100% Brightness

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).