Intentions to Marry, 1887

Reference: Registrar-General of Births, Deaths and Marriages, Notices of intention to marry, Series 8937, R2840399, Archives New Zealand Te Rua Mahara o te Kāwanatanga, Wellington

Imaged by Carole at Archives NZ Wellington, May 14 2025

Page 526

District of Waipawa Quarter ending 30 June 1887

No	Date of Notice	Names and Surnames of Parties	BDM Match	Condition	Calling or Profession	Age	Dwelling Place	Length of Residence	Marriage Place	Folio	Date of Certificate	Officiating Minister
352	7 April 1887	William Low Spence Barbara Annie Mackay	William Low Spence Barbara Annie Mackay 💍 1887/1768	Bachelor Spinster	Station Manager nil	25 25	West side of Tukituki river near Tamumu	5 months 7 years	St Peters Church	87/3460	7 April 1887	Rev. J. C. Eccles.
353	25 April 1887	Niels Christian Petersen Harriet Fowell	Niels Christian Pedersen Harriet Powell 💍 1887/3368	Bachelor Spinster	Laborer nil	33 22	Kaikora Tukehon	5 weeks 13 years	Anglican Church	87/1448	25 April 1887	Rev. S. Williams.
354	27 April 1887	William James Thomas Christina Phillips	William James Thomas Christina Phillips 💍 1887/2334	Bachelor Spinster	Laborer domestic	28 26	Waipawa Waipawa	3 days 5 months	Residence of Mr A. Carskie, Waipawa	87/1225	27 April 1887	Rev. A. Grant.
355	19 May 1887	Harry Castle Catherine Mary Gee	Harry Cautte Catherine Mary Gee 💍 1887/1769	Bachelor Spinster	draper nil	24 21	Waipawa Waipawa	14 years 6 months	Residence of Mr H. Castle, Waipawa	87/1361	19 May 1887	Rev. J. C. Scales.
356	21 May 1887	William John Elliott Maggie May Matheson	William John Elliott Maggie May Matheson 💍 1887/2323	Bachelor Spinster	Brickmaker nil	21 21	Waipawa Hampden	6 years 10 years	Residence of Mr John Matheson, Hampden	87/1224	21 May 1887	Rev. James Wrigley.
357	21 May 1887	Thomas Perce Hobbs Sophia Jane Collins	Thomas Pierce Hobbs Sophia Jane Collins 💍 1887/2341	Bachelor Spinster	Station Hand nil	27 21	Kaikora Kaikora	22 years 21 years	Residence of Mr Collins, Homewood, Kaikora	87/1226	21 May 1887	Rev. A. Grant.
358	30 May 1887	Thomas Cory Elizabeth Samson	Thomas Corlett Elizabeth Richmond 💍 1887/3161 Thomas Mawson Elizabeth Wilson 💍 1887/657 Thomas Murray Elizabeth McIntosh 💍 1887/1341 Thomas Pay Elizabeth Christensen 💍 1887/2311 Thomas Henry Erridge Elizabeth Cameron 💍 1888/61 Thomas Sexton Elizabeth Jarvis 💍 1887/2555 Thomas Elliott Elizabeth Beattie 💍 1888/582	Bachelor Widow	Carpenter nil	27 29	Kaikora Kaikora	10 years 11 months	Office of the Registrar, Waipawa	87/1223	30 May 1887	Saml. Johnson, Registrar.

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).