Intentions to Marry, 1880

Reference: Registrar-General of Births, Deaths and Marriages, Notices of intention to marry, Series 8937, R2840392, Archives New Zealand Te Rua Mahara o te Kāwanatanga, Wellington

Page 317

District of Wanganui Quarter ending Oct - Dec

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
49	9 October 1880	Ernest Forward Sophia Weedon	Ernest Townsend Esther Weedon 💍 1880/2764	Bachelor Spinster	Junior	21 19	Wanganui do	19 yrs 3 days	In the Wesleyan Church Wanganui	744	John Weedon, father, consenting to marriage	23 October 1880	Rev. Mr Lee Wesleyan
50	12 October 1880	Francis O'Dowd Margaret Dundon	Francis O'Dowd Margaret Dundas 💍 1880/2771	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer	26 23	do do	2 yrs. 2 yrs.	In the Roman Catholic Church Wanganui	801		12 October 1880	Rev. P.H.C. Kirk Roman Catholic
51	16 October 1880	Alfred William Waller Ellen Mary Rawlings	Alfred William Waller Ellen Mary Chamberlain 💍 1880/2766	Bachelor Spinster	Gentleman	23 19	do do	1 yr. 1 yr.	William Waller, St Hill Street Wanganui	775	William Waller father consenting to marriage	18 October 1880	Rev. J. Jones England
52	18 October 1880	James Winthorp Anderton Margaret Lonigan	James Wenthrop Anderson Margaret Montgomerie 💍 1880/2775	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	29 18	Maxwelltown Putiki	6 yrs 8 yrs.	In the Parish Church of England	1242/80		18 October 1880	Rev. T.L. Tudor Church of England
53	19 October 1880	Thomas Wolfe Eliza Dennis	Thomas Worle Eliza Dennis 💍 1880/2765	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer	34 23	Wanganui do	3 yrs. 9 mos	In the residence of Mr. S. Bolton	1/241/80		19 October 1880	Rev. Wm Lee Wesleyan
54	27 October 1880	Patrick Lynch Margaret Passy	Patrick Lynch Margaret Casey 💍 1880/2772	Bachelor Spinster	Farm Labourer	24 21	do do	4 days 4 days	Harrison Street, Wanganui			27 October 1880	Rev. B.H. Kirk
55	30 October 1880	Thomas Walton Flora Manton	Thomas Walker Clara Manton 💍 1880/2786	Bachelor Widow	Groom	22 27	do do	7 days 9 days	In the Roman Catholic Church	80/ 1242/80		30 October 1880	S.M. Moran Roman Catholic
56	3 November 1880	Wilfrid Walter Mary Ann Holmes Barlow	Wilfred Waters Mary Ann Holmes Barlow 💍 1880/2767	Bachelor Spinster	Milkman	25 17	do do	24 yrs. 5 yrs.	Wanganui	80/ 1241/80	Frederick Barlow, father	7 Novr. 1880	Rev. Wm Lee Registrar
57	4 December 1880	Charles Edward Best Jane Keilon	Charles Edward Best Mary Neilson 💍 1880/2769	Bachelor Spinster	Joiner	27 21	do do	12 mos 5 yrs.	In the residence of the Rev. Wm Lee, Wanganui	80/ 1243/80		4 Decr. 1880	Rev. Jas. Treadwell Wanganui
58	6 December 1880	George Ross Louisa Black	George Ross Louisa Clark 💍 1880/2773	Bachelor Widow	Assistant	27 32	do do	17 yrs. 2 yrs.	In the residence of Mr. T. In the Office of the Registrar	80/ 1244/80		6 Decr. 1880	Rev. James Treadwell Registrar
59	8 December 1880	John Richmond Eliza J. Neilson	John Richmond Elizabeth Neilson 💍 1880/2770	Bachelor Spinster	Carpenter	28 16	do do	2 yrs. 11 yrs.	Harrison Street, Wanganui	80/ 1242/81		8 Decr 1880	Rev. Wm Lee Wesleyan
60	13 December 1880	Frederick Henry Grant Kate Robertson	Frederick Henry Crawford Kate Robertson 💍 1880/2776	Bachelor Spinster	Brewer	30 20	Wanganui	2 yrs. 8 yrs.	In the residence of John Richmond, Bell Street, Wanganui	1242/80	Elizabeth T[UNCLEAR] consenting to marriage of her granddaughter	18 Decr 1880	Rev. T.L. Tudor Church of England

These records have been automatically transcribed and must be verified using the page image (below)

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Attribution: This image was digitised by Archives NZ Te Rua Mahara o te Kāwanatanga and is republished here under CC BY. It has been cropped and rotated for convenience.

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 1898. More registers will be added when the Archives NZ Wellington reading room re-opens in September 2025.

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).