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 658

District of Nelson Quarter ending 30 June 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	Date of Certificate	Officiating Minister
18	2 April 1894	Albert Edward Lockyer Hannah Remnant	Albert Edward Lockyer Hannah Remnant 💍 1894/2252	Bachelor Spinster	Proprietor Servant	21 22	Valley Nelson Valley Nelson	21 years 3 years	Residence of William Lockyer, Brook Street	94/2143		Rev. James Bray, Baptist Minister, Nelson
19	5 April 1894	Emanuel Stagg Katherine Maria Dorothia Fanselow	Emmanuel Stagg Welhemine Maria Dorothea Fanselow 💍 1894/1549	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer	27 25	Hope Hope	27 years 25 years	Residence of Charles Elliott, Brightwater	94/1581		Rev. S. H. Baker, Church of England Minister, Brightwater
20	7 April 1894	William Raymond Hunt Lucy Challis	William Raymond Hunt Lucy Challies 💍 1894/1550	Bachelor Spinster	Fielder	31 27	Wakefield Ramea West	31 years 27 years	Church, Enstone	94/1582		Rev. S. H. Baker, Church of England Minister, Ramea West
21	10 April 1894	Alfred Lynch Eleanor Mary Wells		Bachelor Spinster	Farmer Dressmaker	30 22	Nelson Nelson	14 days 6 months	All Saints Church, Trafalgar Street, Nelson		Not Solemnized. See letter attached.	Rev. W. F. Hornby, Church of England Minister, Nelson
22	11 April 1894	Joseph Ferson Mary Gerhull Roberts	Joseph Hewson Mary Gertrude Roberts 💍 1894/1565	Widower Spinster	Clerk in Holy Orders	42 22	Stoke Stoke	3 days 6 months	St. Barnabas Church, Stoke, Nelson	94/1573		Rev. A. C. Wright, Church of England Minister, Nelson
23	11 April 1894	Nathan Lirich Leonora Priscilla Jane Armstrong	Jonathan Livick Annora Pricilla Jane Armstrong 💍 1894/2253	Bachelor Spinster	Mechanical Engineer	23 22	Nelson Nelson	23 years 3 months	Residence of Mr. King, Milton Street	94/2144		Rev. Thomas Ray, Baptist Minister, Nelson
24	16 April 1894	Edward Hooker Edwards Ellen Waterhouse	Edward Hooker Edwards Ellen Waterhouse 💍 1894/1588 Edward Henry Ford Elizabeth Waterhouse 💍 1894/2573	Widower Spinster	Butcher Servant	50 30	Nelson Nelson	6 months 30 years	Office of the Registrar of Marriages, Nelson	94/1570		The Registrar of Marriages, Nelson

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).