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 1230

District of Auckland 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	Consent	Date of Certificate	Officiating Minister
443	27 November 1893	George Nicholas Henry Bach Margaret Robinson	George Nicholas Henry Margaret Robinson 💍 1893/2891	Bachelor Spinster	Foreman Boot Factory	24 24	Auckland Auckland	24 years 24 years	St Sepulchre's Church	93/3010		27 November 1893	Ven Archd B. T. Dudley, Church of Eng.
444	28 November 1893	John Soar Wilson Alice Victoria Andrews	John Soar Alice Victoria Andrews 💍 1893/623	Widower Spinster	Bricklayer	32 25	Auckland Ponsonby	30 years 15 years	Registrar's Office	93/3080		28 November 1893	S. H. Lyons, Registrar
445	28 November 1893	Paul Hartner Louden Florence Jane Chapman	Paul Hartner Florence Jane Chapman 💍 1893/3078	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	27 19	Awhitu Green Lane	5 years 4 weeks	House of R. E. Louden	93/3019		11 December 1893	Rev H. W. Miller, Congl. Min.
446	28 November 1893	Edward Harne Rowllings Mary Ann Munro	Edward Warne Rowllings Mary Ann Munro 💍 1893/2984	Bachelor Spinster	Clerk	27 23	Auckland Ponsonby	2 years 3 years	St Sepulchre's Church	93/3009		28 November 1893	Ven Archd B. T. Dudley, Church of Eng.
447	28 November 1893	Allen Dale Cottingham Annie Garrett Munro	Allen Dale Cottingham Annie Barrett 💍 1893/2983	Bachelor Spinster	Grocer	28 25	Newton Freeman's Bay	28 years 2 1/2 years	St Sepulchre's Church	93/3008		28 November 1893	Ven Archd B. T. Dudley, Church of Eng.
448	29 November 1893	John Boulter Johnson Alice Maud Johnson	John Boulter Alice Maud Johnson 💍 1893/3708	Bachelor Spinster	Painter	29 20	Ponsonby Auckland	9 months 20 years	St Patrick's Church	93/3958	Olof Johnson, father	29 November 1893	Rev J. Hackett, Roman Cath.
449	1 December 1893	Walter Hewson Humble Jane Sefton Humble	Walter Hewson Jane Sefton 💍 1893/625	Bachelor Spinster	Carpenter	35 26	Auckland Auckland	18 months 6 months	Registrar's Office	93/3082		1 December 1893	S. H. Lyons, Registrar

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).