Intentions to Marry, 1894

Reference: Registrar-General of Births, Deaths and Marriages, Notices of intention to marry, Series 8937, R2840406, Archives New Zealand Te Rua Mahara o te Kāwanatanga, Wellington

Imaged by Luke at Archives NZ Wellington, June 6 2025

Page 204

District of Wairau Quarter ending 31 March 1894

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
1	3 January 1894	Solomon Lane Emily Elsmore	John Lane Emily Elsmore 💍 1894/525	Bachelor Spinster	Laborer Dressmaker	42 18	Grovetown Grovetown	1 year 18 years	Office of the Registrar of Marriages, Blenheim	94/516	Thomas Elsmore, father	3 January 1894	William O'Callaghan
2	8 January 1894	Thomas Watson Annie Elizabeth Draper	Thomas Watson Annie Elizabeth Draper 💍 1894/530	Bachelor Spinster	Draper None	24 19	Blenheim Blenheim	6 1/2 years 19 years	Royal Hotel, Blenheim	94/520	Daniel Draper, father	8 January 1894	Ven. J. S. Grace
3	10 January 1894	William Mills Elizabeth Catherine Gardner	William Mills Elizabeth Catherine Gardiner 💍 1894/729	Bachelor Spinster	Storeman None	22 20	Blenheim Blenheim	6 years 5 years	Residence of Mr. F. Mills, Grove Road, Blenheim	94/527	Section 27 of Marriage Act 75	25 January 1894	W. O'Callaghan
4	11 January 1894	Joseph Walter Church Emily Bergman	Joseph Walter Clinch Emily Berryman 💍 1894/531	Bachelor Spinster	Sailor Domestic Servant	25 20	Springlands Blenheim	1 1/2 years 18 years	Residence of Mr. Bergman, Bomford Street, Blenheim	94/521	Jane Walter Bergman, mother	11 January 1894	Ven. J. S. Grace
5	19 January 1894	William McRae Helen Mary Grace Murphy	William McRae Hellen Mary Grace Murphy 💍 1894/723	Bachelor Spinster	Station Manager None	31 31	Blenheim Spring Creek	3 days 20 years	Residence of Mr. Murphy, Spring Creek	94/525		19 January 1894	Rev. John McNamara
6	25 January 1894	Daniel Henry March Alice Mary Duck	Daniel Henry March Alice Mary Dick 💍 1894/526	Bachelor Spinster	Farm Labourer None	25 19	Spring Creek Wairau Valley	25 years 19 years	Office of the Registrar of Marriages, Blenheim	94/577	William Duck, father	25 January 1894	William O'Callaghan

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).