Intentions to Marry, 1877

Reference: Registrar-General of Births, Deaths and Marriages, Notices of intention to marry, Series 8937, R2840389, Archives New Zealand Te Rua Mahara o te Kāwanatanga, Wellington

Imaged by Luke at Archives NZ Wellington, April 16 2025

Page 391

District of Napier Quarter ending 31 March 1877 Registrar John Grubb

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
800	01 March 1877	William Pulford Mary Burns	William Pulford Mary Burns 💍 1877/372	Bachelor Spinster	Carter	29 23	Clive Meane	6 months 2 years	Mission Station Meane	77/276	Her Father Regnier	01 March 1877	[illegible]
801	02 March 1877	William Gigg Annie Albert	William Gigg Annie Hopperh 💍 1877/363	Bachelor Widow	Railway Laborer	28 22	Pake Paki Clive	10 months 8 months	St Johns Church	77/268		02 March 1877	Rev. J. Townsend
802	12 March 1877	Hoger Piller Thogersen Christini Christensen	Thoger Miller Thogersen Christina Christensen 💍 1877/356	Bachelor Spinster	Laborer Domestic Servant	25 26	Pake Paki Napier	16 months 2 years	Trinity Wesleyan Church	77/261		12 March 1877	Rev. J. Berry
803	17 March 1877	William Salmon Mary Petril	William Pulford Mary Burns 💍 1877/372 William Sheehan Mary Quirk 💍 1877/3153	Bachelor Spinster	Waiter Cook	25 30	Napier Napier	2 years 5 years	Residence	77/262		17 March 1877	Rev. J. Berry
804	17 March 1877	Arthur M Cartney Annie Hare	Arthur McCartney Annie Hare 💍 1877/1420	Bachelor Spinster	Warehouseman	29 20	Portahurin Clive	2 1/2 years 3 years	Clive Church	77/346		17 March 1877	Rev. W. Marshall
805	29 March 1877	Patrick Oshammany Mary Ann Johnston	Frank Hunt Mary Ann Johnston 💍 1877/2010	Bachelor Spinster	Grocer	29 19	Napier Meane	2 years 16 years	Mission Station	77/900	Joseph Johnson Father	29 March 1877	Rev. F. Regnier
806	31 March 1877	Duncan McRal Jessie Muir	Duncan McRae Jessie Muir 💍 1877/367	Widower Spinster	Seaman Servant	29 29	Napier Napier	3 days 3 years	House of Cameron Dickins	77/241		31 March 1877	Rev. D. Sidey
807	31 March 1877	John Gawhurst Cullen Daroth Lincoln	John Crowhurst Cullen Sarah Lincoln 💍 1877/1279	Bachelor Spinster	Manager of Hawke's Bay Club	30 27	Napier Napier	4 years 2 years	St Johns Church Napier	77/228		31 March 1877	Rev. J. Townsend
808	31 March 1877	Patrick McKenny Margaret H Hamore	Patrick McCarthy Margaret Graham 💍 1877/2725 Patrick McGillin Margaret McMahon 💍 1877/1063 Patrick Monahan Margaret O'Mahoney 💍 1877/419 Patrick Karney Margaret Fahy 💍 1877/2727	Bachelor Spinster	Laborer Servant	32 22	Puketapu Napier	4 months 6 weeks	Catholic Chapel Napier			31 March 1877	Rev. Father Forest

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 1899. More registers are being added almost every week.

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).