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 702

District of Nelson Quarter ending 31 December 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	Date of Certificate	Officiating Minister
55	7 October 1895	Owen Stone Annie Eliza Stratford	Owen Stone Annie Eliza Stratford 💍 1895/2028	Bachelor Spinster	Sheep Farmer	28 23	Aniseed Valley, Waimea East Aniseed Valley, Waimea East	18 months 23 years	Office of The Registrar of Marriages, Nelson	95/3475	7 October 1895	The Registrar of Marriages, Nelson
56	12 October 1895	John Bigger Annie King	John Biggar Annie Ching 💍 1895/2033	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	26 23	Stoke Nelson Stoke Nelson	26 years 23 years	St. James Church, Stoke	95/3480		Rev. S. Marshall, Wesleyan Minister, Richmond
57	12 October 1895	John William Talbot Agnes Reeves	John William Talbot Thyrsa Reeves 💍 1895/2014	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer	26 20	Nelson Haven Road Washington Road, Nelson	8 years 20 years	Residence of Thomas Reeves, Washington Road, Nelson	95/3484		Rev. H. McKenzie, Presbyterian Minister, Nelson
58	12 October 1895	Joseph Grossi Jesse Amelia Talbot	Joseph Alfred Grossi Jessie Amelia Talbot 💍 1895/2013	Bachelor Spinster	Fisherman	28 24	Nelson Haven Road Nelson Haven Road	6 years 20 years	Residence of Paul Talbot, Nelson	95/3483		Rev. H. McKenzie, Presbyterian Minister, Nelson
59	17 October 1895	James Croucher Ada Roseman	Haye Croucher Ada Chapman 💍 1895/2032	Bachelor Spinster	Miller Dressmaker	25 24	Queen Street, Richmond Harley Street, Nelson	2 years 18 months	St. Paul's Church, Richmond	95/3479		Rev. J. Kempthorne, Church of England Minister
60	28 October 1895	Samuel Moore Ellen Byrne	Samuel Wood Ellen Kennedy 💍 1895/3859	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer Domestic Servant	25 28	Wakatu Valley, Nelson Nelson	21 days 28 days	Office of The Registrar of Marriages, Nelson	95/3476	28 October 1895	The Registrar of Marriages, Nelson
61	31 October 1895	John Thomas Barnes Lilian Eva Page	John Thomas Barnes Lilian Ida Page 💍 1895/2015	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	24 28	Suburban, Wakapuaka Suburban, Wakapuaka	3 years 23 years	Trinity Presbyterian Church, Wakapuaka	95/3485		Rev. H. McKenzie, Presbyterian Minister, 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 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).