Intentions to Marry, 1897 January-June

Reference: Registrar-General of Births, Deaths and Marriages, Notices of intention to marry, Series 8937, R2840411, Archives New Zealand Te Rua Mahara o te Kāwanatanga, Wellington

Imaged by Luke at Archives NZ Wellington, June 25 2025

1897 is bound in two volumes, January-June and July-December.

Page 688

District of Palmerston North Quarter ending 30 June 1897

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
32	19 May 1897	John Bell Lillian Mary Bridge	John Bell Lillian Mary Bridge 💍 1897/676	Bachelor Spinster	Woolclasser	24 21	Palmerston North Palmerston North	3 years 21 years	At the office of the Registrar, Palmerston North	97/1651		19 May 1897	Robt. K. Keeling, Registrar, Palmerston North
33	18 May 1897	David Anderson Annie Mathilda Hausen	David Anderson Annie Matilda Hansen 💍 1897/670	Bachelor Spinster	Engine Driver	25 23	Palmerston North Rangitikei Road, Palmerston North	6 years 23 years	Wesleyan Church, Broad Street, Palmerston North	97/1645		21 May 1897	Rev. J. A. Lusgord, Wesleyan Minister, Palmerston North
34	25 May 1897	Alfred Henry Sadd Mary Ellen Watkin	Alfred Henry Sadd Mary Ellen Watkins 💍 1897/653	Bachelor Spinster	Hairdresser	24 22	Palmerston North Palmerston North	3 years 18 months	At the office of the Registrar, Palmerston North	97/1652		25 May 1897	Robt. K. Keeling, Registrar, Palmerston North
35	31 May 1897	William Park Jane Tory formerly Scott	William Park Jane Tory 💍 1897/671	Widower Divorced	Stationer	40 30	Palmerston North Palmerston North	15 years 8 years	At the house of Thomas Tory, Palmerston North	97/1646		1 June 1897	Rev. J. A. Lusgord, Wesleyan Minister, Palmerston North
36	31 May 1897	William John Tucker Emma Rosetta Gray	William John Tucker Emma Rosetta Gray 💍 1897/672	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	22 19	Palmerston North, Carnarvon Palmerston North	1 year 3 days 19 years	At the house of The Gray, Terrace End, Palmerston North	97/1647	Thomas Gray, Father	1 June 1897	Rev. J. A. Lusgord, Wesleyan Minister, Palmerston North
37	1 June 1897	Frederick Healey Alexandra Gray Steuberg	Frederick Healey Alexandra Mary Stenberg 💍 1897/654	Bachelor Spinster	Shepherd	24 23	Palmerston North Palmerston North	3 days 3 days	At the office of the Registrar, Palmerston North	97/1653		1 June 1897	Robt. K. Keeling, Registrar, Palmerston North
38	1 June 1897	Donald Ross Julia O'Sullivan	Donald Ross Julia O'Sullivan 💍 1897/642	Bachelor Spinster	Laborer Waitress	30 28	Palmerston North Palmerston North	3 days 2 months	At the house of Rev. W. Thomson, Palmerston North	97/1640		1 June 1897	Rev. W. Thomson, Presbyterian Minister, Palmerston North

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).