Intentions to Marry, 1881

Reference: Registrar-General of Births, Deaths and Marriages, Notices of intention to marry, Series 8937, R2840393, Archives New Zealand Te Rua Mahara o te Kāwanatanga, Wellington

Imaged by Luke at Archives NZ Wellington, January 31 2025

Page 695

District of Christchurch Quarter ending 31 March 1881

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
15	January 1881	John Dairson Selena Streart		Bachelor Widow	Clerk	28 34	Christchurch Christchurch	5 days 5 days	In the House	81/380		January 19 1881	Rev W. a Paseoc Church of England
16	January 1881	Patrick Co'Malley Mary Mulroyan	Patrick O'Malley Mary Mulroyan 💍 1881/791	Bachelor Spinster	Hatelayer Servant	45 35	Selwyn Christchurch	7 years 14 days	In the Roman Catholic Church	81/4		January 20 1881	Rev L. Ginty Roman Catholic
17	January 1881	John Ferguson Harper & Maud Hornbrook	John Ferguson Harper Dionysia Maud Hornbrook 💍 1881/495	Bachelor Spinster	Accountant	32 20	Christchurch Opawa	5 days 20 years	In St Lukes Church	81/409		January 20 1881	Rev L. a. Luigand Church of England
18	January 1881	William Henry Boyens Esther Jane Dermott	William Henry Boyens Esther Jane Dermott 💍 1881/483	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer	29 19	Templeton Templeton	4 years 15 years	In the Registrars Office	81/420	William Dermott Father	January 22 1881	Registrar of Marriages M Wilkerson
19	January 1881	Francis Lee Elizabeth Godwin	Francis Lee Elizabeth Godwin 💍 1881/484	Widower Widow	Carpenter Tailoress	44 43	Christchurch Christchurch	20 years 6 months	In the Registry Office	81/421		January 25 1881	Registrar of Marriages M Wilkerson
20	January 1881	Robert Robinson Mary Jane Harper	Robert Robinson Mary Jane Harper 💍 1881/1996	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer Servant	28 19	Opawa Opawa	4 years 3 years	In St Andrews Church	81/2015	Jane Harper Mother	January 26 1881	Rev C. Fraser Presbyterian
21	January 1881	Michael Ryan Christine Christensen	Michael Ryan Christina Christensen 💍 1881/2003	Bachelor	Labourer	30 27	Christchurch Christchurch	6 months 7 years	In the House of Pete Jensen	81/2017	Pete Jensen	January 27 1881	Rev C. Fraser Presbyterian
22	January 1881	Thomas Rawson Josephine O'Connor	Thomas Rawson Laren Minnie Josephine O'Connor 💍 1881/492	Bachelor Spinster	Carpenter Servant	23 22	St Albans St Albans	5 years 10 days	In the House of Rev C. Dallaston	81/2016		January 28 1881	Rev C. Dallaston Baptist

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

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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 1894. More registers will be added as the project continues.

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).