Intentions to Marry, 1883

Reference: Registrar-General of Births, Deaths and Marriages, Notices of intention to marry, Series 8937, R2840395, Archives New Zealand Te Rua Mahara o te Kāwanatanga, Wellington

Imaged by Luke at Archives NZ Wellington, May 16 2025.

Page 131

District of Auckland Quarter ending 30 June 1883

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
265	25 June 1883	Arthur James Coyle Elizabeth Maria Fort	Arthur James Coyle Elizabeth Maria Fort 💍 1883/2473	Bachelor Spinster	Cabinet maker Domestic Duties	20 22	Auckland Auckland	20 years 8 years	St Thomas's Church Union Street	83/2569		26 June 1883	Rev. H. G. Davis Church of England
266	25 June 1883	Uriah Stokes Julia Kingdon Hodge	Uriah Stokes Julia Kingdom Hodge 💍 1883/884	Widower Spinster	Coachman	24 21	Remuera Remuera	24 years 11 years	House of Mr. Ann Hodge Orakei Road Remuera	83/800		25 June 1883	Rev. G. B. Monro Presbyterian
267	25 June 1883	Joseph Rae Norah McSwarney	Hugh Rae Norah McMarney 💍 1883/799	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer	25 22	North Shore North Shore	25 years 22 years	Office of Regr. of Marriages Auckland	83/864		25 June 1883	Deputy Regr. of Marriages
268	25 June 1883	Patrick Conlon Maria Looby	Patrick Conlon Maria Looby 💍 1883/813	Widower Spinster	Labourer	26 25	Auckland Auckland	3 years 4 years	Church of St Benedict Newton	83/871		25 June 1883	Very Revd. J. C. Downey Roman Catholic
269	25 June 1883	Patrick O'Keeffe Eliza Corbett	Patrick O'Keeffe Eliza Corbett 💍 1883/812	Bachelor Spinster	Barman	28 19	Auckland Khyber Pass	2 years 8 years	St Benedict's Church Newton	83/876	Roger Corbett Father	25 June 1883	Very Revd. J. C. Downey Roman Catholic
270	26 June 1883	Alfred Poulson Annie Mary Bullock	Alfred Paulson Annie Mary Bullock 💍 1883/2054	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	30 19	Auckland Auckland	14 days 14 days	St Matthew's Church Hobson Street	83/152	Notice	13 July 1883	Revd. W. N. Tebbs Church England
271	26 June 1883	David Todd Mary Emma Powell	David Todd Mary Emma Powell 💍 1883/800	Bachelor Spinster	Sailor	28 24	Auckland Auckland	3 years 22 years	Registrar's Office Auckland	83/865		26 June 1883	Deputy Regr. of Marriages

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 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).