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 696

District of Christchurch 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
393	30 October 1880	James Dearsly Ellen Ullathorne Dawson	James Dearsly Ellen Elizabeth Dawson 💍 1880/200	Bachelor Spinster	Accountant	24 22	Christchurch Christchurch	5 years 14 years	Registrars Office	80/12744		30 October 1880	Registrar Marriages
394	30 October 1880	Charles Wattrel Eliza Hannah Corlett	Charles Withell Eliza Hannay Corlett 💍 1880/115	Widower Spinster	Farmer	44 37	Christchurch Riccarton	3 days 20 years	In the House of Mr. Corlett	80/12740		30 October 1880	Rev. J. Aldred Wesleyan
395	1 November 1880	Andrew Roby Bloxam Katharine Hanny Isabella Smith	Andrew Roby Bloxam Katherine Isabella Smith 💍 1880/211	Bachelor Spinster	Registrar Supreme Court	41 32	Christchurch Christchurch	4 months 3 days	In the Manse	80/12756		1 November 1880	Rev T. Flavell Church of England
396	1 November 1880	George Beaumont Gundry Annie Rudd	George Beaumont Gundry Annie Rudd 💍 1880/688	Bachelor Spinster	Nursery man	31 23	Christchurch Christchurch	3 months 23 years	In the Avonside	80/12686		1 November 1880	Rev. W. A. Pascoe Church of England
397	1 November 1880	James Baring Gould Sarah Collins	James Bainey Gould Eleanor Sarah Collins 💍 1880/210	Bachelor Spinster	Hotel Keeper	29 26	West Coast Christchurch	23 years 26 years	In Hotel Hokitika	80/12738		1 November 1880	Rev. H. C. M. Watson Church of England
398	2 November 1880	John William Pepparell Mary Brice	John William Pepperell Maud Mary Brice 💍 1880/727	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer Servant	21 21	Woolston Christchurch	5 years 3 years	In the House Rev. C. Fraser	80/3133		2 November 1880	Rev. C. Fraser Presbyterian
399	2 November 1880	Thomas Illingworth Hannah Cuthbert		Bachelor Spinster	Painter Servant	22 21	Briggs Road Briggs Road	5 years 2 years	In the Avonside	80/12685		2 November 1880	Rev. W. A. Pascoe Church of England
400	3 November 1880	Henry John Partridge Esther Ulinabirth Jenkins	Henry John Partridge Leslie Esther Elizabeth Jenkins 💍 1880/724	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	29 17	Riccarton Riccarton	1 month 1 month	In the House of Mr. Leslie	80/13430	William John Jenkins father	3 November 1880	Rev. C. Fraser Presbyterian

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).