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 909

District of Tokomairiro Quarter ending 30 June 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
366	1 April 1876	John Smith Chalmers Emily Mortimer	John Smith Chalmers Emily Mortimer 💍 1876/1243	Bachelor Spinster	Stoker	30 20	Tokomairiro Tokomairiro	12 years 12 years	In the house of John Mortimer, Tokomairiro	76/1160	John Mortimer, Father	1 April 1876	Rev. James Chisholm
367	4 April 1876	John Maloney Kate Connor	John Mahoney Catherine Connor 💍 1876/1451	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer	30 22	Tokomairiro Tokomairiro	2 years 7 weeks	Roman Catholic Chapel, Milton	76/1142		4 April 1876	Rev. Thomas Lenchan
368	6 April 1876	John Clyde Hellen Morton	John Clyde Hellen Morton 💍 1876/1249	Bachelor Spinster	Miner Servant	23 21	Tokomairiro Tokomairiro	1 year 11 months	Registrar's Office, Tokomairiro	76/1165		6 April 1876	James Ferguson, Registrar
369	15 April 1876	William John Hart Ellen Taylor	William John Hart Ellen Taylor 💍 1876/1244	Bachelor Widow	Miner Servant	39 27	Tokomairiro Tokomairiro	7 weeks 7 weeks	In the Vestry of the Presbyterian Church, Milton	76/1161		15 April 1876	Rev. James Chisholm
370	4 May 1876	Isaac Yorny Lydia Fryer	Isaac Young Lydia Fryer 💍 1876/1346	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer Servant	29 21	Tokomairiro Tokomairiro	2 years 11 months	In the Manse of the Rev. James G. Paterson, Tokomairiro	76/1163		4 May 1876	Rev. James G. Paterson
371	26 May 1876	Thomas Davidson Emily Sanders	Thomas Davidsen Emily Sanders 💍 1876/1248	Bachelor Widow	Labourer Settler	50 45	Glenore, Tokomairiro Glenore, Tokomairiro	8 months 12 years	St John's Church, Milton	76/1164		26 May 1876	Rev. Richard Coffey
372	31 May 1876	Edward Perkins Elizabeth Yorston	Edward Perkins Elizabeth Yorston 💍 1876/1250	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	31 28	Tokomairiro Tokomairiro	1 week 16 years	Registrar's Office, Tokomairiro	76/1166		31 May 1876	James Ferguson, Registrar
373	16 June 1876	Alexander Kerr Jane Ross	Alexander Kerr Jane Ross 💍 1876/1245	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer Servant	34 23	Tokomairiro Tokomairiro	4 years 9 months	In the Manse of the Rev. James Chisholm, Milton	76/1162		16 June 1876	Rev. James Chisholm

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).