Intentions to Marry, 1879

Reference: Registrar-General of Births, Deaths and Marriages, Notices of intention to marry, Series 8937, R2840391, Archives New Zealand Te Rua Mahara o te Kāwanatanga, Wellington

Imaged by Luke at Archives NZ Wellington, April 30 2025

Page 666

District of Christchurch Quarter ending 30 June 1879

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
144	15 April 1879	Frank Lewis Francis Emma Billeus	Frank Lewis Francis Emma Billens 💍 1879/86	Bachelor Spinster	Engineer	24 24	Christchurch Christchurch	3 days 5 years	In St. Lukes Church	79/1255		15 April 1879	Rev. E. G. Edwards
145	15 April 1879	William Brown Susannah Elizabeth White	William Brown Susannah Elizabeth White 💍 1879/1332 William Brakenrig Elizabeth White 💍 1879/2322	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	21 20	Christchurch Christchurch	3 days 10 years	In the Free Methodist Church	79/1319	Mother	15 April 1879	Rev. J. White
146	16 April 1879	Louis Proctor Blundell Elizabeth Ann Cover	Louis Proctor Blundell Elizabeth Ann Coker 💍 1879/1328	Bachelor Spinster	Newspaper Proprietor	27 21	Christchurch Christchurch	3 days 7 months	In the Wesleyan Church	79/1376		16 April 1879	Rev. T. Flavell
147	16 April 1879	Frederick Charles Edlin Jessie Badden	Frederick Charles Edward Dunning Jessie Bodden 💍 1879/1289	Widower Widow	Fruiterer	37 32	Christchurch Christchurch	4 days 12 years	In the Presbyterian Church, Dunedin	79/1228		16 April 1879	Rev. J. Elmslie
148	16 April 1879	John Shadrach Priest Moiselle Trayhorn	John Shadrach Priest Moisella Waghorn 💍 1879/1342	Bachelor Spinster	Contractor	25 24	Christchurch Christchurch	3 days 14 days	In the Woolston Church	79/1306		16 April 1879	Rev. C. I. Martin
149	16 April 1879	Henry Neale Hannah Eliza Parish	Henry Neale Hannah Eliza Parish 💍 1879/2911	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer	24 22	Springston Springston	7 days 2 years	In his Church, Ashburton	79/1331		16 April 1879	Rev. H. Stocker
150	17 April 1879	James Crosby Martin Louisa Sanderson	James Crosby Martin Louisa Sanderson 💍 1879/2866	Bachelor Spinster	Articled Clerk	22 21	Christchurch Waikari	5 years 16 years	In the house of Mr. Sanderson	79/1241		17 April 1879	Rev. G. I. Cholmondeley
151	18 April 1879	David Leslie Mary Ellen Carlisle	David Leslie Mary Ellen Carlisle 💍 1879/79	Bachelor Widow	Clerk	41 35	Christchurch Christchurch	8 months 7 months	In the Registrars Office	79/1271		18 April 1879	Registrar of Marriages

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).