Intentions to Marry, 1885

Reference: Registrar-General of Births, Deaths and Marriages, Notices of intention to marry, Series 8937, R2840397, Archives New Zealand Te Rua Mahara o te Kāwanatanga, Wellington

Imaged by Carole at Archives NZ Wellington, April 30 2025

Page 1300

District of Auckland Quarter ending 30 September 1885

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
424	14 August 1885	John George Cobbe Amelia Elders	John George Cobbe Frances Amelia Elders 💍 1885/1949	Bachelor Spinster	Draper Spinster	26 22	Auckland Kings Co.	2 years 22	Dwelling of Isma Smith, City Road of Lyttelton	85/2000		14 August 1885	Rev. H. Bull, Wesleyan
425	14 August 1885	Robert Campbell Jane Verous King	Robert Campbell McEwen Carrie Verona King 💍 1885/2023	Widower Widow	Ship Carpenter Stewardess	32 26	Dunedin Dunedin	2 3	Registrars Office, Auckland	85/2081		14 August 1885	J. Owen Lord, Regr.
426	14 August 1885	John James Wilson Rosina Caroline Stark	John Jane Wilson Rosina Caroline Stark 💍 1885/1940	Widower Spinster	Minister Spinster	34 34	Cambridge Southland	14 mos 10 years	Dwelling of R. H. Ribble, Cambridge	85/1997		14 August 1885	Rev. J. Spurgeon, Baptist
427	14 August 1885	John Sill Emily Fitzpatrick	John Gill Emily Fitzpatrick 💍 1885/1951	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer Spinster	31 22	Howick Howick	20 22	Roman Catholic Church, Otahuhu	85/2001		14 August 1885	Rev. M. O'Hara, Roman Catholic
428	14 August 1885	John Thomas Blake Eliza Hastings Vickery	John Thomas Blake Eliza Hastings Vickery 💍 1885/2045	Bachelor Spinster	Interpreter Spinster	32 25	Waotu Auckland	2 mos 25 years	St Benedicts Church, Newton	85/2028		14 August 1885	Rev. M. O'Hara, Roman Catholic
429	15 August 1885	Stephen Morris Mary Curtis	Stephen Morris Mary Curtis 💍 1885/3836	Blacksmith Bachelor Widow	Blacksmith	32 45	Matakana Drury Hills	5 28	St James Church, Matakana	85/2053		15 August 1885	Rev. R. F. Macnicol, Wesleyan
430	17 August 1885	Thomas Edmund Reid Lucy Poole	Thomas Edwin Bird Lucey Poole 💍 1885/2144	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer Spinster	20 19	Northcote	9 1	St Johns Church, Northcote	85/2105	Thomas Edmund Reid Father, James Poole Father	17 August 1885	Rev. A. J. Hitchcock, Church of England

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).