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 718

District of Oamaru Quarter ending 31 December 1877 Registrar W. Gillies

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
615	22 November 1877	Archibald Graham Kate Lyons	Archibald Graham Kate Lyons 💍 1877/2729	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	40 30	Oamaru Oamaru	3 days 4 weeks	Residence of Rev. Antebyores in Exc. that:leomen	77/2438		22 November 1877	Rev. John Armitage
616	23 November 1877	Richard Southby Sarah Annie Ware	Richard Southby Sarah Annie Hare 💍 1877/2731	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer	21 18	Oamaru Oamaru	3 days 3 days	Office of Registrar of Marriages at Oamaru	77/2440	William Ware, Father	23 November 1877	Registrar of Marriages at Oamaru
617	23 November 1877	William Carr Martha Simpson	William Carr Martha Musson 💍 1877/2728	Bachelor Spinster	Blacksmith Domestic Servant	33 26	Weston Weston	4 years 12 months	Residence of Rev. John Armitage	77/2439		23 November 1877	Rev. John Armitage
618	13 December 1877	John Davidson Christina Wilson	John Davidson Christina Wilson 💍 1877/2715	Bachelor Spinster	Carrier Domestic Servant	25 29	Oamaru Oamaru	3 days 3 days	The Manse, Oamaru	77/2424		13 December 1877	Rev. A. B. Todd
619	21 December 1877	Alfred Dray Bessie Ann Palmer	Alfred Dray Bessie Ann Palmer 💍 1877/2716	Bachelor Spinster	Engineer Domestic Servant	25 23	Oamaru Oamaru	3 1/2 years 1 year	Residence of Rev. A. B. Hook, Weston	77/2423		21 December 1877	Rev. A. B. Todd
620	28 December 1877	James Gould McGregor Mary Jane Hudson	James Gould McGregor Mary Jane Hudson 💍 1877/2732	Bachelor Spinster	Trainer of Horses	24 17	Oamaru Oamaru	3 years 17 years	Office of Registrar of Marriages at Oamaru	77/2441	Edward Hudson, Father	28 December 1877	Registrar of Marriages at Oamaru
621	28 December 1877	Daniel Kee Quarrie Emma Searle	Daniel Kee Quarrie Emma Searle 💍 1877/2733	Bachelor Spinster	Butcher	21 21	Oamaru Oamaru	3 years 3 years	Office of Registrar of Marriages at Oamaru	77/2442		28 December 1877	Registrar of Marriages at Oamaru
622	29 December 1877	Olaf Thomas Olsen Elizabeth Byers Dirrell	Olef Thomas Olsen Elizabeth Byers Birrell 💍 1878/541	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer	28 27	Oamaru Oamaru	1 year 2 years	Residence from Dirrell & Olsen	48/522		29 December 1877	Rev. A. S. Todd
623	29 December 1877	Alexander Baxter Janet Kennedy	Alexander Baxter Janet Kennedy 💍 1877/2717	Bachelor Widow	Miner Storekeeper	37 29	Livingstone Livingstone	4 years 10 years	Residence of Rev. Wm Gray in Hull	77/2426		29 December 1877	Rev. A. S. Todd
624	29 December 1877	Alexander Forbes Sarah Morgan	Alex Forbes Sarah Morgan 💍 1878/540	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer Domestic Servant	36 21	Pahakand Oamaru	5 years 3 years	The Residence of Rev. Thomas Burnett, Oamaru	48/521		29 December 1877	Rev. A. S. Todd
625	31 December 1877	John Burthe Bridget Hanley	John Burke Bridgett Hanley 💍 1878/2963	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	28 23	Oamaru Oamaru	3 days 5 years	St. Patrick's Church, Oamaru	77/2984		31 December 1877	Rev. William Coleman

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).