Intentions to Marry, 1895 July-December

Reference: Registrar-General of Births, Deaths and Marriages, Notices of intention to marry, Series 8937, R2840408, Archives New Zealand Te Rua Mahara o te Kāwanatanga, Wellington

Imaged by Carole at Archives NZ Wellington, June 11 2025

1895 is bound in two volumes, January-June and July-December.

Page 248

District of Hokitika Quarter ending 30 September 1895

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
15	8 July 1895	Paul Schroeder Amelia Jane Lane		Bachelor Spinster	Miner Domestic Duties	28 26	Hokitika Hokitika	28 years 26 years	Registrar's Office, Hokitika	95/2551		8 July 1895	Mr. A. S. B. Peacock, Registrar of Marriages, Hokitika
16	10 July 1895	Thomas Stoppforth Edith Jane Morris	Thomas Stopsforth Edith Janet Morris 💍 1895/1555	Bachelor Spinster	Carter Domestic Duties	23 19	Hokitika Kumara	23 years 19 years	St. Mary's Church, Kumara	95/2904	Robert Morris (Father)	16 July 1895	Rev. A. G. Harrison, R. C. Minister, Kumara
17	23 July 1895	James Boyd Agnes Ford	James Boyd Agnes Ford 💍 1895/1220	Widower Spinster	Carpenter Domestic Duties	54 36	Hokitika Kumara	11 years 10 years	Presbyterian Church, Kumara	95/2553		23 July 1895	Rev. W. Douglas, Presbyterian Church, Kumara
18	27 July 1895	James Donovan Eva Frances Patridge	James Donovan Eva Frances Patrick 💍 1895/1534	Bachelor Spinster	Storekeeper Domestic Duties	25 20	Hokitika Hokitika	10 years 5 years	St. Mary's Church, Hokitika	95/2905	William Patridge (Father)	27 July 1895	Rev. A. G. Harrison, R. C. Minister, Hokitika
19	3 September 1895	John S. Campbell Mary Davidson	John King Campbell Mary Davidson 💍 1895/1221	Bachelor Spinster	Clerk Domestic Duties	26 26	Hokitika Hokitika	5 years 6 years	Residence of Mr. S. Davidson, Hokitika	95/2534		3 September 1895	Rev. W. Douglas, Presbyterian Church, Hokitika
20	10 September 1895	Arthur Shannon Emma Macpherson	Arthur Shannon Emma Merewether 💍 1895/1632	Bachelor Spinster	Draughtsman Dressmaker	28 22	Hokitika Stafford	16 years 22 years	St. John's Church, Stafford	95/2984		10 September 1895	Rev. C. W. Robinson, Church of England, Stafford
21	19 September 1895	Henry Buckland Daisy Maltby	Henry Butland Daisy Malfroy 💍 1895/1222	Bachelor Spinster	Miner Domestic Duties	29 21	Hokitika Hokitika	21 years 21 years	Residence of Mr. Maltby, Hokitika	95/2555		19 September 1895	Rev. W. Douglas, Presbyterian Minister, Hokitika
22	21 September 1895	William Williams Jessie Ann Gibbs	William Williams Jessie Ann Little 💍 1895/1217	Bachelor Spinster	Miner Domestic Duties	26 21	Goldsborough Goldsborough	2 years 2 years	Registrar's Office, Goldsborough	95/2532		21 September 1895	Mr. A. S. B. Peacock, Registrar of Marriages, Goldsborough

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).