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 712

District of Oamaru Quarter ending 30 June 1877 Registrar [illegible]

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
571	30 April 1877	Alfred Dawson Elizabeth Henderson	Alfred Dawson Elizabeth Henderson 💍 1877/1175	Bachelor Spinster	Carpenter Cook	38 34	Oamaru Oamaru	3 months 14 days	The manse	77/1043		30 April 1877	Rev⁽ A.B. Todd
572	7 May 1877	Alexander Frame Mary Paterson	Alexander Frame Mary Paterson 💍 1877/1176 James Corran Mary Paterson 💍 1877/1243	Bachelor Spinster	Stotter Domestic Servant	23 21	Oamaru Oamaru	14 months 12 months	The Residence of ew Robert Fulton	77/1044		7 May 1877	Rev⁽ A.B. Todd
573	19 May 1877	Patrick Karney Margaret Fahey	Patrick Karney Margaret Fahy 💍 1877/2727	Bachelor Spinster	Boarding House Keeper Domestic Servant	30 20	Oamaru Oamaru	5 years 14 months	St Patrick's Church	77/2/28	Declaration made that no person in Colony having authority to give consent	19 May 1877	Rev⁽ William Coleman
574	21 May 1877	Robert Blair Mary Turnbull	Robert Blair Mary Turnbull 💍 1877/1177	Bachelor Widow	General Dealer	37 39	Oamaru Oamaru	9 years 9 months	The Residence of mr Robert Blair	77/1045		21 May 1877	Rev⁽ C.A. B. Todd
575	22 May 1877	Bernard Wilkes Dukes Bertha Mary Thompson	Bernard Wilkes Jukes Bertha Mary Thompson 💍 1877/1162	Widower Spinster	French Polisher	29 20	Oamaru Oamaru	18 months 16 years	The Residence of John Thompson	77/1084	John Thompson Father	22 May 1877	Rev⁽ John Armitage
576	25 May 1877	Thomas Rodgers Jane Smith	Thomas Rodgers Jane Smith 💍 1877/1178	Bachelor Spinster	Laborer Domestic Servant	23 23	Oamaru Oamaru	4 years 2 years	The Manse	77/1046		25 May 1877	Rev⁽ A.B. Todd
577	28 May 1877	William Salis Bell Catherine Stewart	William Salis Bell Catherine Stewart 💍 1877/1165 William Smaill Magdalene Stewart 💍 1877/1930	Bachelor Spinster	Butcher Domestic Servant	29 26	Teaneraki Teaneraki	3 years 2 years	The Office of the Registrar of Marriages	77/1084		28 May 1877	W. G. Filleul - Registrar
578	30 May 1877	William Harper Johanna Conroy	William Harper Johanna Conroy 💍 1877/2738	Bachelor Spinster	Farm Servant Domestic Servant	24 20	Oamaru Waitaki Bridge South	2 years 2'2 years	The Residence of the Rev⁽ William Coleman	77/2/29	Declaration made that no person in Colony by having Authority to give consent	30 May 1877	Rev⁽ William Coleman
579	6 June 1877	John Sansom Emily Plumridge	John Sansom Emily Plumridge 💍 1877/1163	Bachelor Spinster	Bricklayer Domestic Servant	21 22	Oamaru Oamaru	3 days 3 weeks	The Residence of ew John Oliver	77/1085		6 June 1877	Rev⁽ John Armitage

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).