Intentions to Marry, 1878

Reference: Registrar-General of Births, Deaths and Marriages, Notices of intention to marry, Series 8937, R2840390, Archives New Zealand Te Rua Mahara o te Kāwanatanga, Wellington

Imaged by Luke at Archives NZ Wellington, March 5 2025

Page 0619

District of Hokitika Quarter ending 31 March 1878

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
763	31 December 1877	Reynold Better Crump Susan Anderson	Reynold Betton Crump Susan Anderson 💍 1878/1197	Bachelor Spinster	Miner Servant	43 years 33 years	Hokitika Hokitika	3 days 18 months	All Saints Church Hokitika	78/1196		7 January 1878	Revd W. Elton
764	7 January 1878	Giovanni Battista Federli Meta Theresa Willberg	Giovanni Battista Federli Meta Theresa Willbey 💍 1878/1198	Bachelor Spinster	Draftsman No Occupation	36 years 21 years	Hokitika Hokitika	18 months 10 years	All Saints Church Hokitika	78/1197		7 January 1878	Revd W. Elton
765	16 January 1878	William Pole Anna Bezpean	William Pole Anna Cezpean 💍 1878/451	Bachelor Spinster	Butcher Domestic	30 years 26 years	Hokitika Hokitika	2 1/2 years 2 1/2 years	St Marys Church Hokitika	78/432		16 January 1878	Revd P. A. Martin
766	30 January 1878	Richard Grove Fready Annie Maude Willberg	Richard Grove Grady Annie Maud Wilkinson 💍 1878/454	Bachelor Spinster	Draper Dressmaker	33 years 26 years	Hokitika Hokitika	2 1/2 years 3 years	Wesleyan Church Hokitika	78/434		30 January 1878	Revd W. Russell
767	31 January 1878	Diedrich Luideman Eliza Theresa Kelly	Diedrich Lindemann Eliza Theresa Kelly 💍 1878/1199	Bachelor Spinster	Engineer Dressmaker	39 years 31 years	Hokitika Hokitika	13 years 3 months	All Saints Church Hokitika	78/1198		31 January 1878	Revd W. Elton
768	4 February 1878	Hugh Patrick Phrisce Anne Brogan	Hugh Patrick McReeves Anne Brogen 💍 1878/443	Bachelor Spinster	Druggist No Occupation	33 years 23 years	Hokitika Kumara	18 months 14 days	St Patricks Church Kumara	Kumara 78/424		4 February 1878	Revd M. McCauley
769	6 February 1878	Heinrich Rudolph Muller Mary Esseling	Heinrich Rudolph Mueller Mary Eggeling 💍 1878/448	Bachelor Spinster	Storekeeper No Occupation	41 years 20 years	Hokitika Hokitika	3 days 3 days	Registrars Office Hokitika	78/429	[illegible] the Colony	7 February 1878	F. Dermott Registrar
770	21 February 1878	Isaiah Whale Minnie Richards	Isaiah Whale Minnie Richards 💍 1878/449	Bachelor Spinster	Miner No Occupation	22 years 16 years	Hokitika Hokitika	10 years 2 years	Registrars Office Hokitika	78/430	Thomas Richards, the Father	21 February 1878	F. Dermott Registrar
771	2 March 1878	John Edward Creasy Mary Ellen Rieran	John Edward Creasy Mary Ellen Keiran 💍 1878/453	Bachelor Spinster	Printer No Occupation	22 years 18 years	Hokitika Hokitika	8 years 1 month	Private Residence of Thomas Kieran Hokitika	78/433	Thomas Kieran, the Father of Minor	2 March 1878	Revd P. A. Martin
772	11 March 1878	Albert William Brinck Susan Rogers	Albert William Briscoe Susan Rogers 💍 1878/1200	Bachelor Spinster	Butcher Servant	26 years 25 years	Hokitika Hokitika	12 months 12 months	All Saints Church Hokitika	78/1199		11 March 1878	Revd W. Elton
773	20 March 1878	William Park Hannah Maria Boby	William Park Hannah Maria Boby 💍 1878/1402	Bachelor Spinster	Stationer No Occupation	21 years 19 years	Hokitika Hokitika	9 years 5 years	All Saints Church Hokitika	78/3372	Hannah Cochran, the Mother of Minor	20 March 1878	Revd W. Elton

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).