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 441

District of Napier 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	Consent	Date of Certificate	Officiating Minister
24	1 April 1880	John Harvey Son Mary Anderson	John Harvey Sims Mary Anderson 💍 1880/1562 John Ogg Mary Anderson 💍 1880/1111	Bachelor Spinster	Station Shand	40 26	Tongoio Western Spit	1 year 3 weeks	Presbyterian Church	80/1944		1 April 1880	Rev D Sidey, Presbyterian
25	1 April 1880	John Franklin Ellen Cox	John Franklin Ellen Cox 💍 1880/1563	Widower Widow	Expressman	43 33	Napier Napier	3 year 4 years	Presbyterian Church	80/1945		1 April 1880	Rev D Sidey, Presbyterian
26	3 April 1880	Alexander Mackey Fanny Bawden	Alexander Mackey Fanny Bowden 💍 1880/1542	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	25 19	Onga Onga Clive	10 years 3 weeks	House of the Parents or Guardians in the Colony		Her Parents or Guardians in the Colony	3 April 1880	Rev J & Spence, Presbyterian
27	14 April 1880	Richard Ernest Peacock Katherine Maybee	Richard Ernest Peacock Katherine Maybee 💍 1880/704	Bachelor Spinster	Printer	22 24	Napier Napier	4 months 3 days	Wesleyan Parsonage	80/1966		14 April 1880	Rev. W. C. Oliver, Wesleyan
28	15 April 1880	Henry Willis Ellen Harmley	Henry Willis Ellen Thornley 💍 1880/1578	Widower Widow	Settler	50 35	Napier Napier	6 years 15 months	House of Henry Willis	80/1964		15 April 1880	Rev W. C. Oliver, Wesleyan
29	19 April 1880	Francis Fiso Alice Armstrong	Francis Tiso Alice Armstrong 💍 1880/1550	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer	30 29	Napier Napier	4 years 16 months	St Mary's Chapel	80/1960		19 April 1880	Rev. F. Forest, Roman Catholic
30	26 April 1880	Samuel Lydford Anne Cook	Samuel Lydford Anne Cook 💍 1880/1583	Bachelor Spinster	Carpenter	30 28	Napier Napier	6 years 8 months	St Johns Church	80/1942		26 April 1880	Rev J. Hill, Church of England
31	28 April 1880	Albert Dowell Mary Ann Mallory	Albert Dowell Mary Ann Mullany 💍 1880/1551	Bachelor Spinster	Master Mariner	26 21	Port Ahuriri Napier	4 years 20 years	St Mary's Chapel	80/1961		28 April 1880	Rev. F. Forest, Roman Catholic

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

100% Contrast

100% Brightness

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).