Intentions to Marry, 1882

Reference: Registrar-General of Births, Deaths and Marriages, Notices of intention to marry, Series 8937, R2840394, Archives New Zealand Te Rua Mahara o te Kāwanatanga, Wellington

Imaged by Carole at Archives NZ Wellington, April 16 2025

Page 620

District of Greymouth Quarter ending 31 March 1881 Registrar William Alfred Barton

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
1	08 February 1882	Peter Pasenti Mary Eleanor Clements	Peter Pesinti Mary Eleanor Clements 💍 1882/359	Bachelor Widow	Gold miner None	40 40	Greymouth Grey mouth	3 Days 3 Days	Office of Registrar	82/450		08 February 1882	W. A. Barlow Registrar
2	10 February 1882	Michael Noonan Ellen McGannon	Michael Noonan Ellen McGannon 💍 1882/352	Bachelor Spinster	Storekeeper Domestic Servant	36 34	Greymouth Greymouth	5 Days 10 Days	Roman Catholic	82/453		10 February 1882	Patrick Roland
3	23 February 1882	William Kinrose Mary Campbelle	William Knox Mary Campbell 💍 1882/356 William Ringrose Mary Josephine Davern 💍 1882/1739 William Long Mary Lambie 💍 1882/3272	Widower Spinster	Railway Station master	44 35	Wallsend Wallsend	22 months 22 months	At the Residence of the said William	82/444		23 February 1882	Charles Standage
4	28 February 1882	John Alfred Boyeson Emma Woods Hare	John Alfred Bergison Emma Woods Ware 💍 1882/357	Bachelor Spinster	Gold miner None	38 33	Greymouth Greymouth	10 days 5 years	Knox Wallsend	82/448		28 February 1882	Charles Standage
5	28 February 1882	William Mills Martin Caroline Pritchard Rondon	William Mali Martin Caroline Pritchard Ronson 💍 1882/358	Bachelor Spinster	Mariner None	30 21	Greymouth Greymouth	2 years 14 years	At the Residence	82/449		28 February 1882	John P. Kempthorne
6	14 March 1882	David Hugh Mary Ann Kent	David Hugh Mary Ann Kent 💍 1882/351	Bachelor Spinster	Gold miner None	27 19	Maori Creek Nelson Creek	22 months 12 years	At the Office of Registrar	82/452	Francis Kent, father of the said Mary Ann Kent.	14 March 1882	W. A. Barlow Registrar
7	20 March 1882	Henry Palmer Catherine Mary Hargreaves	Henry Palmer Catherine Mary Hargreaves 💍 1882/360	Bachelor Widow	Laborer None	47 33	Greymouth Greymouth	15 years 4 years	Greymouth	82/451		20 March 1882	W. A. Barlow Registrar

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 1899. More registers are being added almost every week.

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).