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 467

District of Wairau 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
12	3 April 1880	Thomas Henry Bothwell Rose Darah Strickland	Thomas Henry Rothwell Rose Sarah Strickland 💍 1880/1568	Bachelor Spinster	Malster	26 19	Riverlands Lower Waver Do	6 years 18 months	Presbyterian	790	Harriet Strickland, mother	5 April 1880	Revd William Shirriffs
13	10 April 1880	James Jn. Donnell Bridget Neville	James McDonnell Bridget Neville 💍 1880/1576	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer Domestic Servant	25 20	Springlands Near Bleuheim Bleuheim	4 months 4 months	The Roman Catholic Church Bleuheim	791	[UNCLEAR] no person in the Colony to give consent	10 April 1880	Revd. A.M.J. Sauzeau Roman Catholic
14	19 April 1880	Philip Vercoe junior Ann Thomas	Philip Vercoe Junr Ann Thomas 💍 1880/1569	Bachelor Spinster	Brickmaker	23 20	Bleuheim do	2-1/2 years 18 months	The House of Philip Vercoe Highstreet Bleuheim	791	Thomas Thomas, Father	19 April 1880	Revd. William Shirriffs
15	26 April 1880	Samuel Elsmore Mary Ann Andrell	Samuel Elsmore Mary Ann Andrell 💍 1880/1573	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer	24 19	Grove Town do	2 years 17 years	The House of Jn. Andrell Grovetown Wairau	794	James Andrell, Father	26 April 1880	Revd. T.G. Carr Wesleyan Methodist
16	25 May 1880	Henry Mears Fanny Annie Bradham	Henry Mears Fannie Annie Badham 💍 1880/1574	Bachelor Spinster	Woolwasher Domestic Servant	22 23	Beverley, Omaka Bleuheim	5 years 2 years	The House of Jn. Daniel Draper Grove Road Bleuheim	793/85		25 May 1880	Revd. H.F. Butt Church of England
17	19 June 1880	John Boyle Flora Isabella Isaac	John Boyle Flora McIsaac 💍 1880/1570	Bachelor Spinster	Farm Servant	27 20	Renwick Town do	12 years 20 years	The Presbyterian	792	Helen Isabella Isaac, mother	19 June 1880	Revd. William Shirriffs
18	19 June 1880	Dixon Bailey Jean Scott Isaac	Dixon Catley Jean Scott McIsaac 💍 1880/1571	Bachelor Spinster	Shoemaker	25 18	Renwick Town do	1 year 18 years	The Presbyterian Manse Bleuheim	793	Helen Jn. Isaac, mother	19 June 1880	Revd William Shirriffs
19	21 June 1880	Henry Percy Wyatt Ellen Morgan	Henry Percy Wyatt Ellen Horgan 💍 1880/1577	Bachelor Spinster	Telegraphist Domestic Servant	23 22	Bleuheim do	1/2 years 5 years	The House of Resi. A.M. J. Sauzeau	795		21 June 1880	Revd. A.M. J. Sauzeau Roman Catholic

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).