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 433

District of Masterton Quarter ending 31 December 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
19	31 October 1883	Matthew Dorge Emma Lines	Matthew Doige Emma Lince 💍 1883/3641	Bachelor Spinster	Painter	26 28	Masterton Masterton	4 days 4 days	Registrars office Masterton	83/13546		31 October 1883	John Bagge Registrar
20	13 November 1883	Charles Stuart Margaret Elizabeth Bell	Charles Stuart Margaret Elizabeth Bell 💍 1883/2919	Bachelor Spinster	Draper	39 27	Masterton Masterton	4 days 6 months	House of Mrs L Bell, Cole Street, Masterton	83/12895		13 November 1883	John Bagge Registrar
21	19 November 1883	John Price Ramsey Agnes James	John Price Ramsey Agnes James 💍 1883/3312	Bachelor Spinster	Hotel Keeper	28 19	Masterton Masterton	3 days 3 days	Registrars Office Masterton	83/13547	Charles James Father	19 November 1883	John Bagge Registrar
22	20 November 1883	Thomas Connor Mary French	Thomas OConnor Mary Cronin 💍 1883/3311 Thomas Hodge Mary Fenwick 💍 1883/1929	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer Domestic Servant	24 22	Masterton Masterton	4 years 3 weeks	Roman Catholic Chapel Masterton	83/13545		20 November 1883	Revd F Halbwachs Roman Catholic Priest
23	20 December 1883	James Elliott Mary Jane Baillie	James Elliott Mary Jane Baillie 💍 1883/2918	Bachelor Spinster	Saddler School Teacher	28 40	Masterton Masterton	5 years 4 years	House of Mrs Petersen	83/12894	Stepfather	20 December 1883	Revd L Scott Wesleyan Clergyman
24	22 December 1883	William Hopkins Fanny Amelia Miller	William Tomlins Margaret Julia Miller 💍 1883/1859	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer	28 22	Dalefield Upper Plain Masterton	18 Months 22 years	House of Mrs Thomas Miller	83/12896		22 December 1883	Revd D Fulton Presbyterian Minister
25	24 December 1883	Robert William Rhoda Sampson	Robert Wilton Rhoda Compton 💍 1883/2922	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer	24 18	Upper Plain Manaia Masterton	12 years 18 years	House of Mrs William Sampson	83/12897	Mother	24 December 1883	Revd D Fulton 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 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).