Intentions to Marry, 1889

Reference: Registrar-General of Births, Deaths and Marriages, Notices of intention to marry, Series 8937, R2840401, Archives New Zealand Te Rua Mahara o te Kāwanatanga, Wellington

Imaged by Carole at Archives NZ Wellington, May 23 2025

Page 132

District of Wellington Quarter ending 31 March 1889

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
13	11 January 1889	Charles Jarce Wetherall Eleanor Snoad	Charles Sarel Wetherall Eleanor Snoad 💍 1889/544	Bachelor Spinster	Gentleman	23 22	Wellington Wellington	1 month	St. Pauls	89/299		11 January 1889	Rev. John Still
14	14 January 1889	Charles Newton Eleanor Richards	Charles Hueston Eleanor Richards 💍 1889/560	Bachelor Spinster	Butcher	22 22	Wellington Wellington	4 years 4 years	House of Mr Richards, Wordsworth Street	89/292		14 January 1889	Rev. H. H. Driver
15	15 January 1889	Samuel Cooper Wright Kathleen James	Samuel Cooper Wright Kathleen James 💍 1889/552	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	25 24	Wellington Wellington	1 month 6 years	Registrars office, Wellington	89/307		15 January 1889	W. I. Wyatt
16	16 January 1889	George Edward Bentley Edith Pierleoni	George Edward Bentley Edith Pierleoni 💍 1889/235	Bachelor Spinster	Brickmaker	23 19	Wellington Wellington	4 years 4 years	St. Marks Church	89/267	Raffello Pierleoni, father	16 January 1889	Rev. R. Coffey
17	17 January 1889	William Barnard Dening Martha Elizabeth Lay	William Barnard Seviney Martha Elizabeth Lay 💍 1889/222	Widower Spinster	Meat Preserver	39 32	Wellington Wellington	4 years 4 years	House of Mr Edward Lewis, Abel Smith Street	89/278		17 January 1889	Mr. Edward Lewis
18	19 January 1889	John James Wildermoth Eliza William	John James Wildermoth Eliza Williams 💍 1889/913	Bachelor Spinster	Draper	28 22	Wellington Wellington	10 months 10 months	St. Johns Church	89/846		19 January 1889	Rev. J. Paterson
19	21 January 1889	George Read Russell Alice Jane Godyn Still	George Cecil Russell Alice Jane Evelyn Mills 💍 1889/545	Bachelor Spinster	Lake officer in N.Z. Service	27 24	Wellington Wellington	3 days 3 days	St. Pauls Cathedral	89/300		21 January 1889	Rev. John Still
20	21 January 1889	William Whitehead Elizabeth Marshall	William Meredith Whitehead Elizabeth Marshall 💍 1889/547	Bachelor Widow	Settler Yamaker	38 29	Wellington Wellington	4 years 4 years	St. Pauls	89/302		21 January 1889	Rev. John Still
21	21 January 1889	Robert Watkins Lucretia Young	Robert Watkins Lucretia Young 💍 1889/219	Bachelor Spinster	Blacksmith	26 23	Wellington Wellington	4 weeks 4 weeks	House of Mr Young, Drummond Street	89/274		21 January 1889	Rev. William Lee
22	23 January 1889	Thomas Walker Wilhelmina Olsen	Thomas Walker Wilhelmina Olsen 💍 1889/553	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	21 23	Wellington Wellington	4 days 4 days	Registrars office, Wellington	89/308		23 January 1889	W. I. Wyatt
23	23 January 1889	Christian Hanssen Josepha Janscher	Christian Hansen Busch Josepha Taucher 💍 1889/218	Bachelor Spinster	Upholsterer	29 22	Wellington Wellington	9 months 9 months	House of Bridegroom, Adelaide Road	89/273		23 January 1889	Rev. Joseph Berry
24	25 January 1889	William Nicholas Rensing Catherine O'Neill	William Nicholas Reading Catherine O'Neill 💍 1889/555	Bachelor Spinster	Painter	26 26	Wellington Wellington	1 month 1 month	Registrars office, Wellington	89/310		25 January 1889	W. I. Wyatt

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).