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 823

District of Feilding 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
159	14 July 1884	Richard Climo Fanny Ellen Rusford	Richard Climo Fanny Ellen Luxford 💍 1884/1253	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer	22 20	Halcombe Halcombe	4 1/2 years 7 1/2 years	Registrar's Office, Feilding	84/12129		14 July 1884	James Reattie (Registrar)
160	24 July 1884	Joseph James Mayhew Mary Louisa Howden	Joseph James Mayhew Mary Louisa Dowden 💍 1884/1275	Bachelor Spinster	Cordial Maker	30 19	Feilding Halcombe	5 years 4 years	Church of England, Feilding	84/12126		24 July 1884	Rev. R. Ashwell Jones (Church of England)
161	26 July 1884	Andrew Diamond Mary Ann Coast	Andrew Diamond Mary Ann Read 💍 1884/1274	Bachelor Widow	Settler	26 31	Feilding Feilding	4 years 6 years	Church of England, Feilding	84/12126		26 July 1884	Rev. R. Ashwell Jones (Church of England)
162	26 July 1884	Mathias Petersen Loppea Jensen	Mathias Petersen Sophie Jensen 💍 1884/1271	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer	22 22	Halcombe Halcombe	1 week 1 week	Church, Halcombe	84/12123		26 July 1884	Rev. Carl Chr. Mayer (Lutheran)
163	2 September 1884	Thomas Marson Clara Elizabeth Tucker	Thomas Marsom Clara Elizabeth Tucker 💍 1884/1254	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer	23 20	Feilding Feilding	2 days 1 year	Registrar's Office, Feilding	84/12130	Williams, Father	2 September 1884	James Reattie (Registrar)
164	11 September 1884	Andrew Houston Ellen Harwood	Andrew Hermiston Ellen Amelia Hazelwood 💍 1884/1252	Bachelor Spinster	Butcher	43 20	Halcombe Halcombe	5 years 3 weeks	House occupied by John Humphrey, Makino Road	84/468352		11 September 1884	Rev. R. Ashwell Jones (Church of England)
165	12 September 1884	Norman Robert Hay Emily Starke		Bachelor Spinster	Labourer	23 24	Halcombe Halcombe	4 years 3 years	Church, Halcombe	84/12124		12 September 1884	Rev. Carl Chr. Mayer (Lutheran)
166	29 September 1884	John Drummond Flora Cameron	John McDonald Flora Cameron 💍 1884/1273	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	25 26	Halcombe Halcombe	8 years 6 years	Church, Halcombe	84/12125		29 September 1884	Rev. Matthews McManaway (Roman Catholic)
167	30 September 1884	John Taylor Margaret Honoria Humphrey	John Taylor Maud Louisa Humphrey 💍 1884/1638	Bachelor Spinster	Blacksmith	27 17	Feilding Makino Road	1 year 10 years	House occupied by John Humphrey, Makino Road	84/468352	John Humphrey, Father	30 September 1884	Rev. Hugh, Mr. Murray (Presbyterian)

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).