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 1164

District of Invercargill Quarter ending 30 September 1890 Registrar John Winstanley Wilkie

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
50	4 July 1890	Thomas Evans Sarah Ann Banks	Thomas Evans Sarah Ann Banks 💍 1890/1525	Bachelor Spinster	Storeman	28 30	Invercargill Invercargill	2 years 3 days	House of Mr Thos Evans, Invercargill	90/2717		4 July 1890	Rev Jas Guy
51	5 July 1890	Charles Albert Deproze Isabella Mary Morton	Charles Albert Diprose Isabella Mary Morton 💍 1890/1522	Bachelor Spinster	Joiner	22 22	Invercargill Georgetown	4 days 22 years	House of Mrs Morton, Georgetown	90/2734		5 July 1890	Rev John Ferguson
52	8 July 1890	Alfred Henry Dawson Emily Ann Bonney	Alfred Henry Dawson Emily Ann Bonney 💍 1890/1530	Bachelor Spinster	Laborer	29 28	Brunswick Kennington	13 years 11 years	House of Mr C Bonney, Kennington	90/2718		8 July 1890	Rev James Guy
53	11 July 1890	Frederick Weir Maria Cosgrove	Frederick Weir Maria Cosgrove 💍 1890/1535	Bachelor Spinster	Tailor	25 23	North Invercargill Avenal	25 years 12 years	House of Rev Geo Lindsay, Invercargill	90/2725		11 July 1890	Rev Geo Lindsay
54	15 July 1890	John Critchell Emily Elizabeth Calcutt	John Mitchell Emily Elizabeth Calcutt 💍 1890/1531	Bachelor Spinster	Carter	25 20	South Invercargill Invercargill	11 years 16 years	House of Mr John Calcutt, Tay Street, Invercargill	90/2719	John Calcutt, father	15 July 1890	Rev James Guy
55	17 July 1890	Robert Gorman Mary Burke	Robert Gorman Mary Burke 💍 1890/2687	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	24 22	Invercargill Invercargill	3 days 22 years	Roman Catholic Church, Invercargill	90/2714		17 July 1890	Rev Eu Walsh
56	22 July 1890	Henry Cox Ada Fryer	Henry Cox Ada Fryer 💍 1890/1521	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	22 23	Grove Bush Erakarewa	12 years 3 years	Office of the Registrar, Invercargill	90/2733		22 July 1890	J. W. Wilkie, Registrar
57	23 July 1890	Owen Cameron Phoebe Budge	Ewen Cameron Phoebe Bridge 💍 1890/3783	Bachelor Spinster	Clerk	21 18	Invercargill Invercargill	12 years 9 years	Princess Hotel, Invercargill	90/2720	James Budge, father	23 July 1890	Ven Archdeacon Stocker

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).