Intentions to Marry, 1891

Reference: Registrar-General of Births, Deaths and Marriages, Notices of intention to marry, Series 8937, R2840403, Archives New Zealand Te Rua Mahara o te Kāwanatanga, Wellington

Imaged by Carole and Luke at Archives NZ Wellington, May 28 2025

A few pages are missing due to focus issues.

The Archives NZ CSV index has recorded pages 765, 767 and 769 incorrectly as 795, 797 and 796.

Page 428

District of Gore Quarter ending 30 September 1891

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
15	1 July 1891	Alexander Allen Robert Sarah Lynch	Alexander Alan Robert Sarah Lynch 💍 1891/1873	Bachelor Spinster	Laborer	26 21	Gore Gore	3 days 3 years	Residence of James Sports at Gordon	91/2696		1 July 1891	Rev John a asher, Gore, Presbyterian Clergyman
16	10 July 1891	David Gillespie Christina Gilchrist	David Gillespie Christina Gilchrist 💍 1891/1875	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	36 25	Gore Gore	13 yrs 12 yrs	Residence of Mr Gilchrist at Waikaia Valley	91/2698		10 July 1891	Rev Peter Ramsay, Knapdale, Presbyterian Clergyman
17	5 August 1891	John Hamilton Isabella Campbell	John Hamilton Isabella Campbell 💍 1891/1874	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	34 30	Waimen Gore Waimen Gore	2 yrs 5 yrs	Presbyterian manse at Gordon	91/2697		5 August 1891	Rev John a asher, Gore, Presbyterian Clergyman
18	10 August 1891	John McQueen Catherine Frances Holmes Miller	John McQueen Catherine Frances Holmes Millar 💍 1891/1877	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	41 23	Knapdale Gore Knapdale Gore	22 years 12 yrs	Residence of J.S. Miller, Chatton	91/2699		10 August 1891	Rev Jm Davidson, Gore, Presbyterian Clergyman
19	13 August 1891	James Robertson Barbara Grant	James Robertson Barbara Grant 💍 1891/1878	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	34 31	Mandeville Mandeville	1 Week 2 months	Residence of David Smith near Mandeville	91/2702		13 August 1891	Rev W.P. Brown, Gore, Presbyterian Clergyman
20	4 September 1891	Matthew Shields Charlotte Marion Cameron	Matthew Shields Charlotte Marion Cameron 💍 1891/1871	Widower Spinster	Carpenter	35 20	Gore Gore	9 months 9 months	English Church, Gore	91/2694	Agnes Cameron, mother of Charlotte Marion Cameron at Gore	4 September 1891	Rev Sydney Hawthorne, Gore, English Church Clergyman
21	21 September 1891	William Francis Bennett Aby McKenzie	William Francis Bennett Aby McKenzie 💍 1891/2732	Widower Spinster	Blacksmith	32 20	Waikaka Gore Waikaka Gore	4 yrs 20 yrs	Residence of Donald McKenzie at Waikaka	91/3637	Donald McKenzie, Father of Aby McKenzie at Waikaka	21 September 1891	Rev Peter Ramsay, Knapdale, Presbyterian Clergyman
22	29 September 1891	David Younghusband Annie Hay		Bachelor Spinster	Carpenter	31 24	Pukerau Gore Pukerau Gore	13 yrs 9 yrs	Residence of Mr Hay near Pukerau	91/3646		29 September 1891	Rev Christopher Abernethy, Gore, Wesleyan Clergyman

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 1898. More registers will be added when the Archives NZ Wellington reading room re-opens in September 2025.

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).