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 147

District of Gore Quarter ending 31 March 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
1	22 January 1885	Edward Jackson Agnes Macnair	Edward Jackson Agnes MacNair 💍 1885/962	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	28 21	Gore Gore	5 years 10 years	Registrars office, Gore	85/841		22 January 1885	Theodor King, Registrar
2	5 February 1885	William Broadbent Elizabeth Woolliams	William Broadbent Elizabeth Wooliams 💍 1885/943	Bachelor Spinster	Laborer	29 29	Gore Gore	8 years 5 years at Residence of Chas Woolliams at Arthurton	Gore	85/846		13 February 1885	Rev John Hobbs
3	4 February 1885	James Chittock Elizabeth Evans	James Chittock Elizabeth Evans 💍 1885/942 Jocelyn Johnstone Fletcher Elizabeth Evans 💍 1885/2154	Widower Spinster	Farmer	36 25	Gore Gore	10 years 8 months	English Church, Gore	85/845		3 February 1885	Rev John Hobbs
23	2 January 1885	John Pearson McIntyre Beatrice Nichol	John Pearson McIntyre Beatrice Nichol 💍 1885/946	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	35 25	Chatton Waikaka	17 years at the Residence of Mr William Nichol of Lilliesleaf Farm 8 years at Waikaka	Gore	85/849		23 January 1885	Rev. William Wright
27	20 December 1884	James Richardson Lucy Susannah Hope	James Richardson Lucy Susannah Hope 💍 1885/965	Bachelor Spinster	Insurance Inspector	37 20	Gore Gore	3 days 1 year	English Church, Gore	85/844	No one in colony authorised to give consent	10 January 1885	Rev. John Hobbs
30	21 December 1884	William Byron Maryann Attewell	William Byron Mary Ann Attewell 💍 1885/963	Bachelor Spinster	Rabbiter	24 18	Riversdale Riversdale	4 years 2 years	Registrars office, Gore	85/842	George Attewell - Father	29 January 1885	Theodor King, Registrar
31	3 January 1885	Thomas Adams Clara Green	Thomas Adams Clara Green 💍 1885/964	Bachelor Spinster	Laborer	24 22	Gore Gore	3 years 4 years	English Church, Gore	85/843		31 January 1885	Rev John Hobbs

These records have been automatically transcribed and must be verified using the page image (below)

100% Contrast

100% Brightness

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).