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 719

District of Christchurch 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
238	18 June 1883	Peter Henry O'Rourke Matilda Whitmore	Peter Henry ORourke Matilda Whitmore 💍 1883/3146	Bachelor Spinster	Moulder Servant	23 21	Christchurch Christchurch	11 years 4 years	In the Roman Catholic Church	83/1357		18 June 1883	Rev. L. Quirly
239	18 June 1883	John Youlkin Martha Bellows	John Tonkin Martha Dellow 💍 1883/2202	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer Servant	31 22	Christchurch Christchurch	5 years 22 years	In the House of Mr. Bellows	83/2188		18 June 1883	Rev. W. Morley
240	19 June 1883	Thomas Stevens Catherine McGough	Thomas Stevens Catherine McGough 💍 1883/1199	Bachelor Spinster	Laborer Servant	30 27	Christchurch Christchurch	1 week 1 year	In the Rangiora Registrars Office	83/1304		19 June 1883	Registrar of Marriages M Patterson
241	19 June 1883	James Henderson Mary Smith	James Henderson Mary Smith 💍 1883/1496	Bachelor Spinster	Laborer Servant	25 23	Christchurch Christchurch	3 days 6 years	In the Ashburton Primitive Methodist Church	83/1364		19 June 1883	Rev. T. B. Cocks
242	20 June 1883	James Freeman Ellen Louisa Mary Ruthven	James Freeman Ellen Louisa Mary Ruthven 💍 1883/1224	Bachelor Spinster	Confectioner	34 27	Christchurch Christchurch	3 years 5 weeks	In St. Lukes Church	83/1354		20 June 1883	Rev. L. A. Lingard
243	20 June 1883	Albert Hutton Mary Jane Chaney	Albert Hutton Mary Jane Chaney 💍 1883/1225	Bachelor Spinster	Sailor	22 18	Christchurch Christchurch	5 years 10 years	In St. Lukes Church	83/1355	W. Chaney, Father	20 June 1883	Rev. L. A. Lingard
244	20 June 1883	Richard Berryman Christiana Osborne	Richard Berryman Christiana Osborne 💍 1883/1507	Widower Widow	Laborer Servant	63 49	Christchurch Christchurch	6 months 6 months	In the House of Mrs. Osborne Addington	83/1369		20 June 1883	Rev. L. Wilson
245	22 June 1883	John Wheatley Isabel Hanley	John Wheatley Isabel Stanley 💍 1883/1169	Bachelor Spinster	Compositor	23 23	Christchurch Christchurch	8 years 23 years	In the Marrivale Church	83/1325		22 June 1883	Rev. J. Havell
246	22 June 1883	Samuel Ferguson Sophia Harris	Samuel Ferguson Sophia Harris 💍 1883/1174	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	23 21	River Styx River Styx	8 years 20 years	In St. Michaels Church	83/1329		22 June 1883	Rev. W. Harper

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).