Intentions to Marry, 1896 July-December

Reference: Registrar-General of Births, Deaths and Marriages, Notices of intention to marry, Series 8937, R2840410, Archives New Zealand Te Rua Mahara o te Kāwanatanga, Wellington

Imaged by Luke at Archives NZ Wellington, June 11 2025

1896 is bound in two volumes, January-June and July-December.

Page 320

District of Lyttelton Quarter ending 30 September 1896

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
11	1 July 1896	Alfred Howe Cassidy Elizabeth Porteous	Alfred Howes Cassidy Elizabeth Porteous 💍 1896/2436	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer	24 20	Lyttelton Lyttelton	4 days 6 days	House of Mr. George Porteous, Brenchley, Lyttelton	96/3122		1 July 1896	Rev. W. F. Murray, Wesleyan Minister
12	3 July 1896	William Batson Shutter Louisa Ethel Olton	William Batson Shutter Louisa Ethel Olton 💍 1896/2434	Bachelor Spinster	Butcher	32 26	S.S. Mararoa Lyttelton	8 months 8 years	Office of Registrar of Marriages, Lyttelton	96/3121		3 July 1896	W. Shannaghan, Registrar
13	20 July 1896	Henry Charles Gardner Louisa Mary Button	Henry Charles Gardner Louisa Mary Button 💍 1896/2439	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer	23 27	Lyttelton Lyttelton	23 years 3 years	House of Mr. A. Button, Time Ball, Lyttelton	96/3125		20 July 1896	Rev. W. F. Murray, Wesleyan Minister
14	4 August 1896	Alfred Munt Hester Annie Elizabeth Ayers	Alfred Munt Hester Annie Elizabeth Ayers 💍 1896/2440	Bachelor Spinster	Clerk	24 25	Lyttelton Lyttelton	24 years 25 years	House of Mr. G. Ayers, Ripon St., Lyttelton	96/3126		4 August 1896	Rev. W. F. Murray, Wesleyan Minister
15	7 August 1896	William Lee Elizabeth Robert	William Lee Elizabeth Roberts 💍 1896/2199	Bachelor Spinster	Butcher	19 19	Rapaki Rapaki	12 years 12 months	House of Rev. W. F. Murray, Lyttelton	96/3127	Mary Ann Werley, mother; Joseph Robert, father	7 August 1896	Rev. W. F. Murray, Wesleyan Minister
16	11 August 1896	George Arthur Humfrey Mary Elizabeth Thomas	George Arthur Murphy Mary Elizabeth Thomas 💍 1896/3516	Bachelor Spinster	Farm Labourer	27 20	Leddington Leddington	18 months 12 years	St. Peter's Anglican Church, Leddington	96/4587	Thomas Weary, mother; Thomas, father	11 August 1896	Rev. John Sheldon, Anglican Minister
17	19 September 1896	Abraham Solomon Amelia Henrici	Abraham Solomon Amelia Henrici 💍 1896/2438	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer	25 23	Rapaki Rapaki	10 years 5 months	House of Home, Pare Tika, Rapaki	96/3124		17 September 1896	Rev. C. Coates, Anglican Minister
18	23 September 1896	George Stewart Ellen Nimmo	George Stewart Ellen Nimmo 💍 1896/3026	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer	23 22	Lyttelton Lyttelton	20 years 6 years	House of Mr. Thomas Nimmo, Coleridge St., Lyttelton	96/3984		23 September 1896	Rev. W. F. Murray, Wesleyan Minister

These records have been automatically transcribed and must be verified using the page image (below)

100% Contrast

100% Brightness

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).