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 633

District of Hastings Quarter ending 30 September 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
242	2 July 1892	John Mayo Mary Louisa Gardner	John Malony Isabella Rosie Gardner 💍 1892/852	Bachelor Spinster	Saddler	21 20	Hastings H Bay Hastings H Bay	1 week 1 week	Residence of W Proctor, Hastings	92/2391	Ralph Gardner, Father	2 July 1892	Rev R Fraser
243	5 July 1892	Joseph McCoy Sadies Louisa Carroll	Joseph McCoy Sadie Louisa Carroll 💍 1892/2255	Bachelor Widow	Labourer House Keeper	40 40	Hastings H Bay Hastings H Bay	4 years 3 years	Cathedral, Napier	92/2394		5 July 1892	The Dean of Waiapu
244	18 July 1892	William Charles Parker Clara Alice Johnston	William Charles Parker Clara Alice Johnston 💍 1892/2247	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer	24 23	Hastings H Bay Hastings H Bay	3 day 1 month	St Matthews Church, Hastings	92/2387		18 July 1892	Rev John Hobbs
245	22 August 1892	George Brown Alexina Smith McDougall	George Brown Alice May Smith McDougall 💍 1892/2250 George Munro Ann Naismitt McDougall 💍 1893/179	Bachelor Spinster	Cab Driver	21 15	Hastings H Bay Hastings H Bay	2 years 14 years	Registrar's Office, Hastings	92/2389	Hannah Harrison, Guardian	22 August 1892	Robert Brathwaite, Registrar
246	25 August 1892	Thomas Seed Mary Hayden	Thomas Seed Mary Hayden 💍 1892/2338	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer	23 24	Tomoana H Bay Napier	3 years 24 years	Roman Catholic Church, Napier	92/2937		25 August 1892	Rev Father Grogan
247	29 August 1892	Allen Marsh Williams Amy Gardner	Allen Marsh Williams Amy Gardiner 💍 1892/2248	Widower Widow	Sheepfarmer	41 36	Hastings H Bay Tomoana H Bay	3 days 3 days	St Matthews, Hastings	92/2388		29 August 1892	Ven Archdeacon Williams
248	12 September 1892	Matthew John Joll Catherine Loylie	Matthew John Joll Catherine Wyllie 💍 1892/2251	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer House Keeper	32 28	Hastings H Bay Hastings H Bay	5 years 3 days	Residence of M Joll, Pukahu, Havelock	92/2390		12 September 1892	Rev R Fraser

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).