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 672

District of Hokitika 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
4	14 April 1894	Frederick Weeks Margaret Staines	Richard Beck Margaret Staines 💍 1894/2769	Bachelor Spinster	Miner Spinster	30 23	Hokitika Hokitika	15 years 6 years	Church of England, Hokitika	94/3074	14 April 1894	Rev. F. G. Lascelles, Church of England, Hokitika
6	16 April 1894	Augustine Smoragga Hannah Batten		Bachelor Widow	Miner Widow	69 56	Hokitika Hokitika	30 years 24 years	Residence of Registrar, Hokitika	94/3071	16 April 1894	Rev. D. O'Hallahan, Registrar, Hokitika
6	23 April 1894	Frederick T. Pope Emily E. Gates	Frederick Lee Emily Jones 💍 1894/1356	Bachelor Spinster	Miner Spinster	23 20	Hokitika Hokitika	5 years 16 years	All Saints, Hokitika	94/1595	23 April 1894	Rev. J. F. Darby, Church of England, Hokitika
7	25 April 1894	Albert John Brown Laura J. Dephina	Albert John Brown Maria Frances Ogilvie 💍 1894/2768	Bachelor Widow	Miner Widow	48 35	Hokitika Hokitika	7 years 18 years	All Saints, Hokitika	94/3073	25 April 1894	Rev. F. G. Lascelles, Church of England, Hokitika
8	25 April 1894	James H. Huddlestone Emily J. Gates		Bachelor Spinster	Labourer Spinster	30 26	Hokitika Hokitika	15 years 25 years	Residence of Emily J. Gates, Hokitika	94/1600	25 April 1894	Rev. C. A. Fraser, Registrar, Hokitika
9	30 April 1894	George Stewart Catherine Forster	George Stewart Catherine Forster 💍 1894/1493	Widower Widow	Constable Widow	48 33	Hokitika Hokitika	1 year 25 years	Residence of Catherine Forster, Hokitika	94/1601	30 April 1894	Rev. C. A. Fraser, Registrar, Hokitika
10	15 May 1894	William Oliver Elizabeth S. Pritchard	George William Oliver Elizabeth Ellen Pritchard 💍 1894/1564	Bachelor Spinster	Miner Spinster	26 24	Hokitika Hokitika	8 years 1 year	All Saints Church, Hokitika	94/1596	15 May 1894	Rev. J. F. Darby, Church of England, Hokitika
11	21 May 1894	John Pearce Elizabeth Morrison	John Pearce Alice Elizabeth Pye 💍 1894/3539	Bachelor Spinster	Miner Spinster	23 22	Hokitika Hokitika	18 years 22 years	Residence of Elizabeth Morrison, Hokitika	94/1602	21 May 1894	Rev. C. A. Fraser, Registrar, Hokitika
12	29 May 1894	Henry Smith Isabella Marshall	Henry Dangerfield Smith Isabella Marshall 💍 1894/1477	Bachelor Spinster	Miner Spinster	30 20	Hokitika Hokitika	9 days 3 years	All Saints, Hokitika	94/1597	29 May 1894	Rev. J. F. Darby, Church of England, Hokitika
13	2 June 1894	Arthur Graham Sidney Hopkins		Bachelor Spinster	Plasterer Spinster	29 21	Hokitika Hokitika	3 years 20 years	All Saints, Hokitika	94/1598	2 June 1894	Rev. J. F. Darby, Church of England, Hokitika

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).