Intentions to Marry, 1892

Reference: Registrar-General of Births, Deaths and Marriages, Notices of intention to marry, Series 8937, R2840404, Archives New Zealand Te Rua Mahara o te Kāwanatanga, Wellington

Imaged by Luke at Archives NZ Wellington, May 28 2025

Page 115

District of TIMARU Quarter ending 31 December 1892

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
59	8 November 1892	William Mann Adeline Wells	William Mann Adeline Wells 💍 1892/3951	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer	23 years 19 years	Timaru Timaru	18 years 19 years	Residence of Mr Charles Wells, Latter Street, Timaru	92/3689	Charles Wells, Father	8 November 1892	Rev. Charles Philip Brown, Baptist Minister
60	14 November 1892	Thomas James Parkes Adeline Nicholls	Thomas James Parkes Adeline Nicholls 💍 1892/3955	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer	32 years 22 years	Timaru Washdyke	5 years 22 years	Residence of Mr Henry Nicholls, Washdyke	92/3693		14 November 1892	Rev. Philip John Cocks, Church of England Minister
61	17 November 1892	Henry James Ball Cornelia Lavinia Presland	Henry James Dall Camelia Lavinia Presland 💍 1892/3956	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer	22 years 24 years	Timaru Timaru	2 years 4 years	St Mary's Episcopalian Church, Timaru	92/3694		17 November 1892	Ven. Archdeacon Henry W. Harper, Church of England Minister
62	1 December 1892	Peter Cooper Emily Wright	Peter Cooper Emily Wright 💍 1892/3962	Bachelor Spinster	Shepherd	42 years 27 years	Washdyke Pleasant Point	2 years 1 year	Residence of Mr Robert Kerslake, Pleasant Point	92/3699		1 December 1892	Rev. Joseph White, Presbyterian Minister
63	3 December 1892	William Charles Rapsey Maud Mary Rawstorn	William Charles Rapsey Maude Mary Rawstom 💍 1892/3458	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	23 years 28 years	Pareora Timaru	23 years 28 years	Residence of Mr Hiram Rawstorn, Stafford Street, Timaru	92/3701		3 December 1892	Rev. William J. Woodward, Primitive Methodist Minister
64	3 December 1892	Thomas Stanley Philpott Catherine Leahy	Thomas Stanley Philpott Catherine Leahy 💍 1892/3468	Bachelor Spinster	Horse Collar Maker	22 years 19 years	Timaru Timaru	9 months 2 years	Roman Catholic Chapel, Timaru	92/3705	Mary Leahy, Mother; Father dead	3 December 1892	Rev. John Tubman, Roman Catholic Clergyman
64	12 December 1892	Daniel Elliott Mary Elizabeth Gibson	Daniel Elliott Mary Elizabeth Gibson 💍 1892/3453	Bachelor Spinster	Groom	24 years 26 years	Hadlow Hadlow	3 years 5 years	Residence of Mr James Strachan, Sarah Street, Timaru	92/3714		12 December 1892	Rev. William Gillies, Presbyterian Minister
65	7 December 1892	Charley Randall Fanny Jacobs	Charley Randall Fanny Tombs 💍 1892/3960	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer	25 years 24 years	Kingsdown Timaru	7 weeks 7 days	Registrar's office, Timaru	92/3697		7 December 1892	Thomas Stowley, Registrar of Marriages, Timaru
66	10 December 1892	Theodore Foster Eliza Attiwell	Theadore Foster Eliza Attiwell 💍 1892/3961	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer	42 years 22 years	Pleasant Point Pleasant Point	6 weeks 1 month	Registrar's office, Timaru	92/3698		10 December 1892	Thomas Stowley, Registrar of Marriages, Timaru

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).