Intentions to Marry, 1890

Reference: Registrar-General of Births, Deaths and Marriages, Notices of intention to marry, Series 8937, R2840402, Archives New Zealand Te Rua Mahara o te Kāwanatanga, Wellington

Imaged by Luke at Archives NZ Wellington, May 23 2025

Page 1235

District of Auckland Quarter ending 31 December 1890 Registrar J. Owen Lord

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
500	23 December 1890	Alexander Forsyth Hannah Eliza Fountain	Alexander Forsyth Gorrie Hannah Eliza Fountain 💍 1890/1541	Bachelor Spinster	Gentleman	29 26	Auckland Auckland	29 years 26 years	Registrar's Office	90/2973	23 December 1890	J. Owen Lord, Registrar
501	23 December 1890	Patrick James McDermott Emma Jane Grocott	Patrick James McDermott Emma Jane Vercoe 💍 1890/3784	Bachelor Spinster	Plumber	23 22	Ponsonby Grafton Road, Auckland	12 years 20 years	Dwelling of Robert Grocott	90/2870	23 December 1890	Revd. A. J. Smith, P. Methodist
502	23 December 1890	Alfred Edward Denton Annie Puttimor	Alfred Edward Fenton Annie Buttimore 💍 1890/1542	Bachelor Spinster	Draper	31 29	Devonport Bombay	10 years 25 years	Registrar's Office	90/2974	23 December 1890	J. Owen Lord, Registrar
503	24 December 1890	Charles William Marshall Elizabeth Fanny Fabb	Charles William Marshall Elizabeth Fanny Gabb 💍 1891/3385	Bachelor Spinster	Artilleryman	28 27	Takapuna Newton, Auckland	5 years 4 months	Dwelling of Alfred Dalton, Kepine	91/118	24 December 1890	Mr. George Aldridge, Ch. of Christ
504	24 December 1890	Alexander Fraser Vail Catherine Sarah Spender	Alexander Fraser Vail Catherine Sarah Huckstep 💍 1890/1543	Bachelor Spinster	Chainman	21 24	Dargaville Auckland	5 years 24 years	Registrar's Office	90/2975	24 December 1890	J. Owen Lord, Registrar
505	24 December 1890	Stephen O'Hanrahan Emma Walmsley	Stephen OHanrahan Emma Walmsley 💍 1890/3786	Bachelor Spinster	Setter	22 22	Tauranga Tauranga	2 years 22 years	Registrar's Office	90/2976	24 December 1890	J. Owen Lord, Registrar
506	24 December 1890	George Jones Jenny Howell	George Jones Fanny Howell 💍 1890/2748	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer	29 24	Devonport Devonport	6 years 10 years	Holy Trinity Church	90/2879	24 December 1890	Revd. J. Bates, Ch. of England

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 1899. More registers are being added almost every week.

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).