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 571

District of Rangiora 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
686	13 July 1892	George Edwin Cassidy Agnes Taylor	George Edwin Cassidy Agnes Taylor 💍 1892/2389	Bachelor Spinster	Laborer Domestic	21 17	Woodend Woodend	9 years 1 year	Office of the Deputy Registrar, Rangiora	92/2488	Allen Taylor, mother	13 July 1892	E. Good
687	1 August 1892	Moses Thomas Wales Emily Ann Pursey	Moses Thomas Waters Emily Ann Pursey 💍 1892/2399	Bachelor Spinster	Laborer not any	29 22	Ashley Ashley	9 years 22 years	Residence of Mr S.W. Pursey, Ashley	92/2497		1 August 1892	Rev. R. Fouch
688	2 August 1892	Donald Brock Mary Ann Peach	Donald Brock Mary Ann Peach 💍 1892/2387	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer not any	28 20	Loburn Ashley	12 years 20 years	Residence of Mr M. Peach, Ashley	92/2486	Manoah Peach, Father	2 August 1892	Rev. H. Redstone
689	8 August 1892	James Taylor Laura Cassidy	James Taylor Laura Cassidy 💍 1892/2390	Bachelor Spinster	Laborer not any	21 21	Woodend Woodend	18 years 8 years	Office of the Deputy Registrar, Rangiora	92/2489		8 August 1892	E. Good
690	20 August 1892	William Martin Annie Ellen Barker	William Martin Annie Elsie Barker 💍 1892/2400	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer not any	30 26	Loburn Loburn	4 days 36 years	Residence of Mr J. Barker, Loburn	92/2498		20 August 1892	Rev. R. Fouch
691	22 August 1892	Ernest Fitzwilliam Morgan Cecilia Marshall	Ernest Fitzwilliam Morgan Cecilia Marshall 💍 1892/2339	Bachelor Spinster	Laborer not any	25 21	Southbrook Southbrook	10 days 8 days	Residence of Mr H. Morgan, Southbrook	92/2938		22 August 1892	Rev. J.J. Prindray, Oxford
692	28 September 1892	William Henry Tomlinson Johannah Doyle	William Harry Tomlinson Johannah Doyle 💍 1892/2388	Bachelor Spinster	Shepherd not any	32 21	Glentui Loburn	14 years 31 years	Catholic Church, Rangiora	92/2487		28 September 1892	Very Rev. D.P. O'Connor

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).