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 993

District of Port Chalmers Quarter ending 31st of December 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	Date of Certificate	Officiating Minister
16	13 October 1881	James Cleghorn Annabella Leslie	James Cleghorn Anabella Leslie 💍 1881/2925	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	28 Years 24	Glendermid, Port Chalmers Russell Street, Dunedin	10 Months 8 Years	At the House of Rev Geo. Leslie, Russell Street, Dunedin	81/2999	13 October 1881	Revd. R. Waddell, Presbyterian Minister
17	25 October 1881	Hugh Miller Harriet Bagley	Hugh Miller Harriet Bagley 💍 1881/3182	Bachelor Spinster	Clerk	29 years 23	St Leonards, Port Chalmers do	14 days 12 Months	At the House of Mr Bagley, St Leonards	81/3093	1881 October 25th	Revd. James Maxwell, Congregational Minister
18	4 November 1881	John Sinclair Jessie McIntyre	John Sinclair Jessie McIntyre 💍 1881/3180 John Sinclair Bessy Henry 💍 1881/1033	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer Dressmaker	24 Years 24	Scotia Street, Port Chalmers do	3 days 4 Years	At the House of Mr W. B. Mackay, Scotia Street, Port Chalmers	81/3091	1881 November 4th	Revd. D. Salmond, Presbyterian Minister
19	19 November 1881	Edward Simmonds Mary Todds	Edmund Simmonds Mary Dodds Moir 💍 1881/2981 Edward Simmonds Johanna Simmonds 💍 1881/1149	Bachelor Widow	Joiner	28 Years 23	George Street, Port Chalmers King Street, Dunedin	10 Years 9 days	at Knox Church, Dunedin	81/3036	1881 November 19th	Revd. D. Stuart, Presbyterian Minister
20	28 November 1881	Joseph Anderson Kernhan Catherine Harland	Joseph Anderson Kernohan Catherine Harland 💍 1881/3183	Bachelor Spinster	Bootmaker	30 Years 27	George Street, Port Chalmers do	10 Years 5 days	At the House of Mr Harland, off George Street, Port Chalmers	81/3094	1881 November 28th	Revd. John Beckham, Congregational Minister
21	12 December 1881	William Gardner Elizabeth Simpson	Thomas Bailey Elizabeth Simpson 💍 1881/1920 William Flicker Sarah Simpson 💍 1881/2302	Bachelor Spinster	Engineer	28 Years 25	Tug Plucky, Port Chalmers Rickliffe Terrace, Port Chalmers	4 Years	At the House of Mr Menelaus, Rickliffe Terrace, Port Chalmers	81/3089	1881 December 12th	Revd. John Ryley, Presbyterian Minister

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).