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 189

District of Drury Quarter ending 31 December 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
245	4 October 1876	Archibald W. Gill Euphemia Buchan	Archibald McGill Euphemia Buchanan 💍 1876/2369	Bachelor Spinster	Settler	29 years 21 years	Pokeno Pokeno	11 years 11 years	In the Dwelling House of Mr Samuel Gordon, Pokeno	76/2554		4 October 1876	The Revd Thomas Norrie, Papakura
246	11 October 1876	John Cornes Mary McPherson	John Cornes Mary McPherson 💍 1876/2368	Bachelor Minor	Miner	26 years 20 years	In Drury Pokeno	3 days 11 years	In the Dwelling House of Mrs Mary McPherson, Pokeno	76/2553	Mary McPherson, Mother	11 October 1876	The Revd Thomas Norrie, Papakura
247	3 November 1876	Thomas Mills Jane Astley	Thomas Wells Jane Astley 💍 1876/2334	Bachelor Widow	Storekeeper	34 years 28 years	Mercer Mercer	2 years 1 year	In the Dwelling House of Mr George Hoskins, Mercer	76/2543		3 November 1876	The Revd Benjamin Drake, Auckland
248	6 November 1876	Samuel Hewitt Storey Jane Storey	Samuel Hewitt Jane Storey 💍 1876/2931	Bachelor Minor	Settler	30 years 20 years	Pukekohe Pukekohe	10 years 2 months	St Pauls Church, Auckland	76/3006	Charles Nelson, Father	6 November 1876	The Revd Charles Nelson, Auckland
249	17 November 1876	Hugh Donahoe Annie Kilie	Hugh Donahoe Annie Kilie 💍 1876/2361	Widower Spinster	Settler	40 years 36 years	Maketu Maketu	7 years 3 months	Roman Catholic Church, Drury	76/2552		17 November 1876	The Revd James McDonald, Drury
250	20 November 1876	Hugh Roberts Jones Margaret Jane Thomas	Hugh Roberts Jones Margaret Jane Thomas 💍 1876/2370	Bachelor Widow	Settler	36 years 32 years	Hunua Hunua	6 months 4 days	In the Dwelling House of Mr John Morrison, Hunua	76/2555		20 November 1876	The Revd Thomas Norrie, Papakura
251	27 November 1876	Thomas Young Annie Lukas	Thomas Young Annie Lukas 💍 1876/2371	Bachelor Minor	Settler	22 years 18 years	East Pukekohe East Pukekohe	2 years 10 years	In the Dwelling House of Mr John Young, Pukekohe	76/2556	Mathew Lukas, Father	27 November 1876	The Revd Thomas Norrie, Papakura
252	5 December 1876	Moses Crocker Martha Smith	Moses Crocker Martha Smith 💍 1876/2844	Widower Spinster	Tailor	61 years 45 years	Auckland Razor Back	3 days 2 months	In Drury, In the Residence of Mr Hugh Mackey, Razor Back	76/2893		5 December 1876	The Revd John Warren, Auckland
253	19 December 1876	Alfred James Berry Elizabeth Ashdown	Alfred James Berry Elizabeth Ashdown 💍 1876/2372	Bachelor Spinster	Postmaster	23 years 21 years	Drury Drury	2 years 5 years	In the Residence of Mr William Ashdown, Drury	76/2557		19 December 1876	The Revd Thomas Norrie, Papakura

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).