Intentions to Marry, 1884

Reference: Registrar-General of Births, Deaths and Marriages, Notices of intention to marry, Series 8937, R2840396, Archives New Zealand Te Rua Mahara o te Kāwanatanga, Wellington

Imaged by Luke at Archives NZ Wellington, April 30 2025

Page 1172

District of Dargaville Quarter ending 30 September 1884

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
12	5 July 1884	Peta Mauman Katarina Ihaka	Pita Maumau Katarina Ihaka 💍 1884/597	Bachelor Spinster	gumdigger	26 14	Hax mill Dargaville Mount Wesley	1 year 10 years	Registrars office, Dargaville	84/1903	Ihaka (Father)	5 July 1884	F A Gould
13	10 July 1884	Hemi Watine Keti Hoani	Hemi Watene Keti Hoani 💍 1884/598	Bachelor Spinster	Native Native	28 24	Maropiu Dargaville Maropiu Dargaville	2 years 2 years	Maori church, Kaihu Valley	84/1904		10 July 1884	Wiki te Paa, Coff
14	11 August 1884	John James Clark Annie Eliza Whitehouse	John James Clark Annie Eliza Whitehouse 💍 1884/2642	Bachelor Spinster	Boatman	38 30	Kaihu Hax Mill Kaihu Hax Mill	10 years 2 months	Residence of Mr Wm Dudding, Kaihu Hax Mill	84/1901		11 August 1884	Thos G Brooke, Wes
15	12 August 1884	Arthur Pobequin Margareta te Karauna	Arthur Pobequin Margarita Te Karauna 💍 1884/590	Bachelor Spinster	Gumdigger Native	35 22	Omu Dargaville Omu Dargaville	3 years 3 years	Registrars Office, Dargaville	84/1902		12 August 1884	F A Gould, Regr
16	24 August 1884	Henare Ihaka Mata Riwhi	Henare Ihaka Tu Mata Riwhi 💍 1884/3770	Bachelor Spinster	Native Native	24 21	Awahea Awahea	14 years 21 years	Aperahamas House Awahea	84/1900		24 August 1884	Rameka Ewera, Waiteripuru, Wes
17	30 August 1884	Rapana Tarahanga Huhana Tepaite	Rapana Tarahanga Huhana Te Paiti 💍 1884/599	Widower Spinster	Native Native	25 22	Kapehu Waiorua	9 years 6 months	Temporary Maori church, Near Babylon	84/1905		30 August 1884	Wiki te Paa, Coff
18	2 September 1884	Tamati Mohi Hiiria Johnson	Tamati Mohi Huria Johnson 💍 1884/2641	Bachelor Spinster	Native	18 15	Oruariki Mount Wesley	18 years 10 years	Aperahamas House Awahea	84/1899	Mohi Ruru (Father), Pete Johnson (Mother)	2 September 1884	Rameka Ewera, Waiteripuru, Wes
19	4 September 1884	Tangata Tiarere Roka Rota	Tangata Tiarere Roka Rota 💍 1884/600	Bachelor Spinster	Native Native	24 24	Hax mill Dargaville Babylon Dargaville	6 months 4 months	Temporary Maori Church, Near Babylon	84/1906		4 September 1884	Wiki te Paa, Coff

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).