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 367

District of Wellington Quarter ending Apr - Jun

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
83	1 April 1880	Robert Henry Medland Kate Patten	Robert Henry Medland Kate Patten 💍 1880/2049	Bachelor Spinster	Compositor	35 29	Wellington Hutt	4 years 6 weeks	St. Pauls	80/1599	1 April	Rev. B.W. Harvey
84	3 April 1880	Sidney Clark Barrand Annie Holmeten	Sidney Clark Barraud Annie Holmden 💍 1880/2050	Bachelor Spinster	Bank Manager	26 23	Hutt Wellington	4 years 2 years	St. Pauls	80/1600	3 April	Rev. B.W. Harvey
85	5 April 1880	Thomas Gilbert Sarah Ann Brand	Thomas Gilbert Sarah Ann Brand 💍 1880/2239	Widower Spinster	Farmer	45 22	Ohariu Valley Wellington	24 years 1 year	Mr Yaldens House in Arthur Street	80/1624	5 April	Revd. W.S. Potter
86	6 April 1880	William George Emery Polly Heslewood	William George Emeny Polly Hesselwood 💍 1880/2253	Bachelor Spinster	Cabinet Maker	20 20	Wellington	10 years 2 years	St. Peters Church	80/1572	6 April	Revd. Archdeacon Stock
87	6 April 1880	John White Mary Ann Hyland	John White Maryanne Hyland 💍 1880/2029	Bachelor Spinster	Seaman	25 24		7 years 1 year	Catholic Church	80/1594	6 April	Revd. P. Kerrigan
88	7 April 1880	Charles Kemp Bridget Hastings	Charles Kemp Bridget Hastings 💍 1880/2261 Charles Mann Jane Hastings 💍 1880/1367	Widower Spinster	Engine Driver	25 22		4 years 3 years	Catholic Cathedral	80/1576	7 April	Revd. John the Nanama
89	April 1880	Thomas Dorreen Mary Lewer	Thomas Darreen Mary Lewer 💍 1880/2033	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer	27 17	Ohanid	9 months Lifetime	Registrars Office	80/1606	21 April	H. Clapcott
90	10 April 1880	George Lomas Emma Little	George Lomas Emma Little 💍 1880/2249	Bachelor Spinster	Sailor	21 22	Petone Lower Hutt	7 years 6 months	Methodist Chapel	80/1580	12 April	Revd. G. Denton
91	12 April 1880	Edwin Butler Alice Emily Reid	Edwin Butler Alice Emily Reid 💍 1880/2258	Bachelor Spinster	Contractor	31 21	Upper Hutt Wellington	31 years 10	St. Peters Church	80/1563	12 April	Revd. Archdeacon Stock
92	12 April 1880	Claude Heam Clara Charlotk Sievers	Claude Hearn Clara Charlotte Sievers 💍 1880/2262	Bachelor Spinster	Editor of Chemical	27 21		1 1/2 years	Catholic Cathedrale	80/1591	12 April	Revd. John the Nanama
93	14 April 1880	Samuel Branch Elyalith Webb	Samuel Crauch Elizabeth Webb 💍 1880/2038	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer	24 17	Upper Hutt Wellington	18 months 5 years	Registrars Office	80/1611	1 May	H. Clapcott
94	15 April 1880	Francis Kitto Amelia Dennd formerly Amelia Bremner	Francis Kitto Amelia Dimond 💍 1880/2256	Bachelor	Sailor	27 28	Wellington	3 15	House of F. Kitto Taranaki Street	80/1593	15 April	M.B. Heastone

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).