Intentions to Marry, 1876

Reference: Registrar-General of Births, Deaths and Marriages, Notices of intention to marry, Series 8937, R2840388, Archives New Zealand Te Rua Mahara o te Kāwanatanga, Wellington

Imaged by Alexandra at Archives NZ Wellington, January 31 2025

A few of the pages are missing.

Page 101

District of Auckland Quarter ending 31 March 1876

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
493	24 March 1876	James Owens Maria Thomas	James Owens Maria Thomas 💍 1876/204 James Muir Mary Thomas 💍 1876/2800	Bachelor Spinster	Blacksmith Servant	28 23	Auckland Auckland	3 days 3 days	Office of the Registrar of Marriages Auckland	76/266		24 March 1876	Regr. of Marriages
494	24 March 1876	James Thomas Warren Mary Bella Boardman	John Thomas Warren Mary Bella Boardman 💍 1876/1463	Bachelor Spinster	Bank Proprietor	34 23	Usually of Auckland Auckland	10 years 10 years	All Saints Church Auckland	76/1628		24 March 1876	Revd. C. M. Bree CofE
495	27 March 1876	Charles Borthwick Mary Ann Goulding	Charles McLachlan Borthwick Mary Ann Gaulding 💍 1876/162	Bachelor Spinster	Clerk	21 20	Eden Terrace Auckland Eden Terrace Auckland	growth growth	Dwelling house of Mr. Goulding, Eden Terrace Auckland	76/24	Joseph Goulding, Father	27 March 1876	Rev. Jas Wallis PhD Pres
496	28 March 1876	Charles Overton Sophia C. Amold	Charles Overton Sophia Elizabeth Smales 💍 1876/775	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	36 22	Usually of Auckland East Tamaki	3 days 2 years	St John's the Church of England	76/684		28 March 1876	Rev. R. A. Hall CofE
497	27 March 1876	James Harcombe Elizabeth Edwards	James Havesnape Elizabeth Edwards 💍 1876/1212	Bachelor Spinster	Slater	27 26	Kyber Pass Kyber Pass	10 years 4 years	Dwelling house of Mr. C. Edwards Schoolmaster Kyber Pass	76/1253		27 March 1876	Rev. Jas Wallis PhD Pres
498	27 March 1876	George Gouldburn Elizabeth Ashton	George Conlam Elizabeth Ashton 💍 1876/3078	Widower Spinster	Farmer	40 30	Kyber Pass Grafton Road	14 years 2 years	Office of the Registrar of Marriages Auckland	76/267		27 March 1876	Regr. of Marriages
499	29 March 1876	James McMillan Rose Shields	James McMillan Rose Shields 💍 1876/170	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer Servant	28 25	Usually of Ohaupo, Auckland Queen Street Auckland	2 weeks 2 weeks	St Patricks Cathedral Auckland	76/9		29 March 1876	Revd. W. McDonald RC

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).