Intentions to Marry, 1893

Reference: Registrar-General of Births, Deaths and Marriages, Notices of intention to marry, Series 8937, R2840405, Archives New Zealand Te Rua Mahara o te Kāwanatanga, Wellington

Imaged by Carole and Luke at Archives NZ Wellington, June 6 2025.

A few pages are missing due to focus issues.

Page 1504

District of Christchurch Quarter ending 31 December 1893

No	Date of Notice	Names and Surnames of Parties	BDM Match	Condition	Calling or Profession	Age	Dwelling Place	Length of Residence	Marriage Place	Folio	Date of Certificate	Officiating Minister
408	11 December 1893	Henry Catterice Wade Adela Frances Ronalds	Henry Cotterill Adela Frances Ronalds 💍 1893/3208	Widower Spinster	Solicitor	35 25	Christchurch Christchurch	35 years 2 years	St Michaels Church	93/3542	11 December 1893	Rev A. P. Mc Farlane, Church of England
409	11 December 1893	James Henderson Annie Eliza Damna Wolff	James Henderson Annie Eliza Emma Wolfe 💍 1893/3764 James Henderson Alice Charlotte Keys 💍 1893/3478	Bachelor Spinster	Salesman	27 26	Christchurch Christchurch	2 years 26 years	St John's Church	93/4081	11 December 1893	Rev H. C. M. Watson, Church of England
410	11 December 1893	Arthur Beaumont Gerty Mary Jane Gallop	Arthur Beaumont Gerty Mary Jane Gallop 💍 1893/3217	Bachelor Spinster	Freemason	22 21	Christchurch Christchurch	22 years 7 years	St Matthews Church	93/3551	11 December 1893	Rev H. Williams, Church of England
411	11 December 1893	Frank Cooper Agnes Mary Dunn	Frank Cooper Agnes May Dunn 💍 1893/3762	Bachelor Spinster	Clerk	31 23	Christchurch Christchurch	19 years 3 years	St John's Church	93/4080	11 December 1893	Rev H. C. M. Watson, Church of England
412	12 December 1893	James Davies Annie Elizabeth Baxter	James Davies Annie Elizabeth Baxter 💍 1893/3775	Bachelor Spinster	Bootmaker Draper	33 23	Christchurch Christchurch	3 days 12 years	St Paul's Presbyterian Church	93/4039	12 December 1893	Rev F. Glendining, Presbyterian
413	12 December 1893	Stephen Payne Mary Fussell	Stephen Payne Mary Fussell 💍 1893/3652	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer	23 27	Christchurch Christchurch	17 years 2 years	Episcopalian Church	93/3945	12 December 1893	Rev R. R. Cotterill, Church of England
414	15 December 1893	Frank Harrison Louise May	Frank Harrison Louisa May 💍 1893/3557	Bachelor Spinster	Fitter	24 23	Christchurch Christchurch	24 years 25 years	Wesleyan Church	93/3868	15 December 1893	Rev W. Baumber, Wesleyan

These records have been automatically transcribed and must be verified using the page image (below)

100% Contrast

100% Brightness

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).