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 545

District of Wairau 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	Consent	Date of Certificate	Officiating Minister
187	3 June 1887	Samuel Jennings Alice Bailey	Samuel Jennings Alice Bailey 💍 1887/3460	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	31 years 26	Lua marina Blenheim	about 15 years about 7 years	The House of Mr. J.B. Cleaytor, Marshlands	87/1282		3 June 1887	Revd. F.H. Spencer
188	6 June 1887	Arthur John Taylor Margaret Smith	Arthur John Taylor Margaret Smith 💍 1887/3437	Bachelor Spinister	Farmer Domestic Servant	22 19	Marshlands, Lua marina Marshlands, Lua marina	about 12 years 3 years	The House of Mr. Thomas Robinson, Lua marina	87/1283	No person resided in the Colony having authority to give consent.	6 June 1887	Revd F.H Spencer
189	9 June 1887	Ernest Charles Barleyman Pauline Elliott	Ernest Charles Barleyman Pauline Elliott 💍 1887/3194	Bachelor Spinster	Law Clerk	21 22	Blenheim Blenheim	about 15 years 22	The Church of the Nativity, Blenheim	87/1273		9 June 1887	Revd L.S. Grace
190	17 June 1887	James Harvey Mary Hornby	James Harvey Mary Hornby 💍 1887/3459	Bachelor Spinster	Butcher	23 22	Blenheim Blenheim	3 20	The House of Mr. W.F. Steer, South Side, Blenheim	87/1281		17 June 1887	Revd John Crump
191	18 June 1887	Henry Edward Mears Alice Elizabeth Miller	Henry Edward Mears Alice Elizabeth Esther Miller 💍 1887/3458	Bachelor Spinster	Watchmaker	21 18	Blenheim Blenheim	11 18	The House of Mr. John Miller, Blenheim	87/1280	John Miller, Father	18 June 1887	Revd John Crump
192	30 June 1887	Edmond Ahern Maria Burke	Edmund Ahern Maria Burke 💍 1887/495	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer	27 24	Lua marina Blenheim	about 7 years 4 years	The Roman Catholic Church, Blenheim	87/2124		30 June 1887	Revd W.J. Lewis

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).