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 932

District of Hamilton Quarter ending 30 June 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
114	9 April 1884	George Nichols Lumee Cecilia Lambert	George Nichols Luine Cecilia Lambert 💍 1884/899	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer Domestic Servant	27 22	Hamilton Hamilton	9 years 1 year	At the Office of the Registrar	84/1077		9 April 1884	B. C. Beale, Registrar
115	15 April 1884	Charles Hinton Alice Mary Ann Steadman	Charles Hinton Alice Mary Ann Steadman 💍 1884/892	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	26 19	Hamilton Hamilton	18 years 9 years	At the Hamilton Hall East	84/1040	John Steadman, Father	15 April 1884	Revd George Aldridge, Evangelist
116	16 April 1884	John McNicol Eliza Forsythe Young	John McNicol Eliza Forsaith Young 💍 1884/932	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	25 25	Huntly Cambridge	2 1/2 years 3 years	At the house of Mr Young, Cambridge	84/1088		16 April 1884	Revd John Mackay, Presbyterian
117	17 April 1884	Walter Booke Mary Esther Vowles	Walter Coop Mary Esther Vowless 💍 1884/893	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	23 18	Piako Road Hamilton	3 years 17 years	At the Hamilton Hall East	84/1071	Teresa Vowles, mother	17 April 1884	Revd George Aldridge, Evangelist
118	3 May 1884	Francis James Hunter Britten Eliza Emma Hunter	Francis James Hunter Britten Eliza Jane Hunter 💍 1884/900	Formerly married in [illegible] Hooper Spinster	Farmer	30 26	Whatawhata Whatawhata	10 years 7 years	At the Office of the Registrar	84/1078		3 May 1884	B. C. Beale, Registrar
119	10 May 1884	Jaed Myles Jane McGlynn	Fred Myles Jane McGlynn 💍 1884/2486	Bachelor Spinster	Miner	28 22	Huntly Mercer	2 years 10 years	At the Roman Catholic Church	84/1081		10 May 1884	Revd A. Fox, Roman Catholic
120	10 May 1884	John Maurice Lord Mary Blanche Dart Lang	John Maurice Lord Mary Blanche Dart Lang 💍 1884/914	Bachelor Spinster	Carpenter Saleswoman	27 18	Ngaruawahia Ngaruawahia	1 year 6 years	At the dwelling of the Revd R. O. C. Briggs	84/1069	The person in the Colony having authority to give consent	24 May 1884	Revd R. O. C. Briggs, Episcopalian

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).