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 424

District of Napier 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
769	20 November 1876	George William Warner Agnes Charmside		Bachelor Spinster	Seaman Servant	32 38	Port Ahuriri Port Ahuriri	3 years 4 years	House of Revd D Sidey			20 November 1876	Rev D Sidey
770	24 November 1876	Joseph Russell Elliott Emily Hyde	Joseph Russell Elliott Emily Hyde 💍 1876/2873	Bachelor Spinster	Station Manager	32 27	Hastings Hastings	2 years 3 weeks	St Johns Church	76/2972		24 November 1876	Rev J Townsend
771	27 November 1876	Peter Farquhar Colledge Elizabeth Smith	Peter Farquhar Colledge Elizabeth Smith 💍 1876/2810	Bachelor Spinster	Stationer	25 22	Napier Napier	4 years 20 years	House of W Smith	76/2683		27 November 1876	Rev J Campbell
772	30 November 1876	John Robertson Junior Mary Hare	John Robertson Mary Hare 💍 1876/2809	Bachelor Spinster	Jeweller	23 20	Napier Clive	3 years 3 months	House of John Hare	76/2682	John Hare, Father	30 November 1876	Rev A Shepherd
773	5 December 1876	August Johansen Roos Anna Maria Christensen	August Johanson Ross Anna Marie Christensen 💍 1876/2930	Bachelor Spinster	Laborer	23 24	Napier Napier	3 months 10 months	House of Rev I.S. Smalley	76/3028		5 December 1876	Rev I S Smalley
774	5 December 1876	James Robert Scott Agnes Beale	James R Scott Agnes Beale 💍 1876/3033	Bachelor Spinster	Tobacconist	27 21	Napier Napier	3 months	House of the Rev I S Smalley	76/3034		5 December 1876	Rev I S Smalley
775	6 December 1876	John Scholes Emily Jane Cooper		Bachelor Spinster	Gardener	29 18	Hastings Taradale	4 months 2.5 years	All Saints Church, Taradale	76/273		6 December 1876	Rev P B Anderson
776	9 December 1876	Robert Gallagher Eliza White	Robert Gallagher Eliza White 💍 1876/2789	Bachelor Spinster	Plumber Barmaid	22 27	Napier Napier	8 months 6 months	Roman Catholic Chapel, Napier	76/2677		9 December 1876	Rev J Forest
777	12 December 1876	Jorgen Marthin Christiansen Bodil Kirstine Jensen		Widower Spinster	Fisherman	41 32	Napier Napier	9 months 9 months	House of the Rev W Marshall	76/274		12 December 1876	Rev W Marshall

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).