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 303

District of Wanganui Quarter ending 31 March 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	Date of Certificate	Officiating Minister
18	12 February 1879	H. K. Whittington Saley [illegible]		Bachelor Spinster	Bricklayer	25 22	Wanganui Wanganui	3 days 3 years	English Church	79/183	12 February 1879	T. L. Tudor
19	13 February 1879	Albert E. Sale Esther Comax	Albert Edwin Exley Esther Lomax 💍 1879/278	Bachelor Spinster	Woolbroker	27 22	Wanganui Wanganui	9 months 22 years	Wesleyan Church	79/169	13 February 1879	William Lee
20	20 February 1879	David Clark Quinis Blythe	David Clarke Annie Blythe 💍 1879/280	Bachelor Spinster	Carpenter	23 19	Wanganui Wanganui	13 months 8 years	Wesleyan Church	79/169	20 February 1879	William Lee
21	22 February 1879	Denis Clifford Marion Edgley	Denis Clifford Marion Edgley 💍 1879/292	Bachelor Spinster	Shoemaker	36 27	Wanganui Wanganui	6 months 4 days	Roman Catholic Church	79/184	22 February 1879	C. H. Kirk
22	22 February 1879	William Brooks Frances Northerd	William Brooks Frances Thorburn 💍 1879/1803	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer	21 24	Wanganui Wanganui	21 years 8 months	English Church	79/185	22 February 1879	T. L. Tudor
23	24 February 1879	Hugh McMaster Ellen Farms	Hugh McMaster Ellen Fawns 💍 1879/309	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	33 33	Wanganui Wanganui	4 days 3 years	Residence of Mrs Hogg, Wanganui	79/198	24 February 1879	James Tradwell
24	26 February 1879	Chas. Bowzie Amy Wood	Charles Benzie Amy Wood 💍 1879/281	Bachelor Spinster	Sawyer	25 25	Wanganui Wanganui	9 days 4 months	Residence of S. Brown, Wanganui	79/199	26 February 1879	William Lee
25	3 March 1879	Robert Blythe Ellen Donald	Robert Blythe Ellen Donahay 💍 1879/282	Bachelor Spinster	Shopman	21 21	Wanganui Wanganui	8 years 12 years	Residence of Mr. P. Ann, Wanganui	79/163	3 March 1879	William Lee
26	8 March 1879	John Cameron Jean Neilson	John Cameron Jean Neilson 💍 1879/310	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	36 18	Wanganui Wanganui	2 years 11 years	Residence of Mr. Hogg, Wanganui	79/183	8 March 1879	James Tradwell
27	17 March 1879	B. A. R. Klein E. M. H. Brandon		Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	29 22	Wanganui Wanganui	4 days 7 days	English Church	79/183	17 March 1879	T. L. Tudor
28	21 March 1879	Wm. Bookington Mary Kitchen	William Lockington Mary Kitchen 💍 1879/273	Bachelor Widow	Carpenter	42 48	Wanganui Wanganui	4 days 5 days	Registrars Office	79/165	21 March 1879	S. W. Noon
29	29 March 1879	Andrew Anderson Bettie Montgomerie	William Anderson Bettie Montgomerie 💍 1879/1027	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	25 18	Wanganui Wanganui	3 years 7 years	English Church	79/183	29 March 1879	T. L. Tudor

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).