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 680

District of Christchurch Quarter ending Jul - Sep

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
293	24 July 1880	Abraham Parish Martha Goodrick	Abraham Parish Martha Spink Goodrick 💍 1880/2410	Bachelor Spinster	Wheelwright	21 17	Springston Springston	3 years 15 years	In the Springston Church	81/294	Robert Goodrick, Father	24 July 1880	Rev. J.A. Teakle
294	26 July 1880	Charles Bourke Mary McGregor	Charles Bourke Mary McGregor 💍 1880/321	Bachelor Spinster	Artist	30 20	Christchurch Christchurch	3 days Signature illegible	In the House of Rev. C. Fraser	81/262	No person having authority	26 July 1880	Rev. C. Fraser
295	26 July 1880	James Osborn Amelia Thompson	James Osborn Amelia Thompson 💍 1880/2323	Bachelor Spinster	Portrait Painter	23 21	Sydenham Sydenham	2 months 2 months	In the Registrars Office	81/291		26 July 1880	Registrar Marriages Sydenham
296	27 July 1880	Robert Biddle Georgiana Shackleton	Robert Diddon Georgene Shackleton 💍 1880/2352	Bachelor Spinster	Book Keeper	22 24	Christchurch Christchurch	6 weeks 8 months	In the German Church Montreal Street	80/2021		27 July 1880	Rev. P.G. Jacobsen
297	27 July 1880	George William Hodges Elina Pidgeon	George William Hodges Eliza Emma Pidgeon 💍 1880/323	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	38 30	Christchurch Christchurch	1 week 1 week	In the House of Rev. C. Fraser	80/2064		27 July 1880	Rev. C. Fraser
298	27 July 1880	Henry William Smith Jane Thorn	Henry William Smith Mary Jane Thornboe 💍 1880/2445	Widower Spinster	Woodsman Nurse	41 21	Christchurch Christchurch	15 years 2 years	In St. Michaels Church	80/2079		27 July 1880	Rev. R.G. Penny
299	28 July 1880	Arthur Appleby Mary Barnett	Arthur Appleby Alice Mary Barnett 💍 1880/2411	Widower Spinster	Accountant	32 21	Christchurch Christchurch	4 years 4 years	In the [UNCLEAR] Church	80/2033		28 July 1880	Rev. R. Langridge
300	28 July 1880	William Shephard Elizabeth Wilkins	William Shepherd Elizabeth Wilkins 💍 1880/300	Bachelor Spinster	Master	26 21	Opawa Opawa	6 months 4 months	In the house of Mr. Shephard	80/2065		28 July 1880	Rev. C. Fraser

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).