Intentions to Marry, 1886

Reference: Registrar-General of Births, Deaths and Marriages, Notices of intention to marry, Series 8937, R2840398, Archives New Zealand Te Rua Mahara o te Kāwanatanga, Wellington

Imaged by Luke at Archives NZ Wellington, May 14 2025

Page 851

District of Turanga Quarter ending 30 September 1886

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
440	19 August 1886	August Duncan Mearn Yates Jane Rutherford Broome		Bachelor Spinster	Schoolmaster Schoolmistress	35 26	Pahiatua, Wellington Provincial District Gisborne, Poverty Bay	3 years 6 years	St. John's Church at Napier	86/2125		19 August 1886	Rev. W. E. Bert Howell
441	20 August 1886	Edwin Samuel Goldsmith Mary Sarah Allen Reynolds	Edwin Samuel Goldsmith Mary Sarah Allen Reynolds 💍 1886/1990 Edwin Samuel Goldsmith Mary Sarah Allen Reynolds 💍 1886/1990	Bachelor Spinster	Draper	29 21	Gisborne, Poverty Bay Gisborne, Poverty Bay	2 1/2 years 10 years	The Wesleyan Church at Albert Gisborne	86/1959		20 August 1886	Rev. Thomas T. Wills
442	11 September 1886	Philip William Donner Ellen Dunlop	Philip William Donner Ellen Dunlop 💍 1886/2021 Philip William Donner Ellen Dunlop 💍 1886/2021	Bachelor Spinster	Sheepfarmer	23 24	Gisborne, Poverty Bay Gisborne, Poverty Bay	8 months 24 years	The residence of Mr. C. R. Bennett at Gisborne	86/1965		11 September 1886	The Rev. John McRae
443	14 September 1886	John Fraser Imes Emily Dunlop	John Fraser Innes Emily Dunlop 💍 1886/2022 John Fraser Innes Emily Dunlop 💍 1886/2022	Bachelor Spinster	Surgeon	33 20	Gisborne, Poverty Bay Matakatea, Poverty Bay	3 years 20 years	The residence of Mr. C. R. Bennett at Gisborne	86/1966	James Dunlop, Father of Bride	14 September 1886	The Rev. John McRae
444	14 September 1886	William Parker Ereti Waititi	William Parker Ereti Waititi 💍 1886/2795 William Parker Ereti Waititi 💍 1886/2795	Bachelor Spinster	Storekeeper Domestic Servant	39 26	Waiomatatini, Waiapu Te Horo, Waiapu	4 years 20 years	The Waiomatatini Hotel at Waiapu	86/2754		14 September 1886	Rev. Mohi Turei
445	18 September 1886	Walter Sidney Gardner Elizabeth Jane Jeffs	Walter Sidney Gardner Elizabeth Jane Jeffs 💍 1886/2017 Walter Sidney Gardner Elizabeth Jane Jeffs 💍 1886/2017	Bachelor Spinster	Ironmoulder Dressmaker	21 21	Gisborne, Poverty Bay Gisborne, Poverty Bay	10 weeks 2 weeks	The Congregational Church at Gisborne	86/1961		18 September 1886	Rev. Andrew H. Wallace

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).