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 018

District of Quarter ending

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
80	15 February 1897	Henry Marcus Cooper Alice Philcox	Henry Marcus Cooper Alice Philcox 💍 1897/4038	Bachelor Spinster	Clerk	28 21	Auckland Auckland	15 years 21	Church of England	97/66		15 February 1897	Rev. J. Bates, Church of England
81	17 February 1897	Ernest Alfred East Mabel East	Ernest Alfred East Mabel East 💍 1897/1455	Bachelor Spinster	Clerk	22 19	Auckland Auckland	5 months 3 days	St. Matthew's Church	97/2519	Edward East, father	17 February 1897	Rev. T. Fitzgerald, Church of England
82	17 February 1897	John James McDougall Jeannie McRae Brown	John James Peter McDougall Jeanie McKell Brown 💍 1897/3753	Bachelor Spinster	Mariner	24 27	Aratapu Aratapu	2 years 20	St. James Church	97/119		17 February 1897	Rev. R. F. Macnicol, Presbyterian
83	17 February 1897	Samuel Scarborough Mary Andrew	Samuel Scarborough Mary Andrew 💍 1897/3776	Bachelor Spinster	Gardener	28 26	Auckland Pakuranga	25 years 22	Presbyterian Church	97/44		17 February 1897	Rev. D. J. Steele, Presbyterian
84	18 February 1897	Edmund Bear Ewart Anne Gilso	Edmund Oscar Ewart Annie Giles 💍 1897/3754	Bachelor Widow	Farmer	30 35	Kingsland Kingsland	2 years 3	House of the Bride	97/120		18 February 1897	Rev. R. F. Macnicol, Presbyterian
85	18 February 1897	James Currie Doull Sarah Firth	James Currie Derell Sarah Firth 💍 1897/4053	Bachelor Spinster	Dairyman	27 25	Auckland Auckland	37 years 16	Wesleyan Church	97/58		18 February 1897	Rev. R. Dawsbury, Wesleyan Methodist
86	18 February 1897	Alfred Henry White Georgina Lilian Middleton Stamlin	Alfred Henry White Georgina Lilian Middleton Hamlin 💍 1897/4076	Bachelor Spinster	Accountant	33 29	Auckland Auckland	33 years 29	St. Matthew's Church	97/82		18 February 1897	Rev. J. Gould, Church of England

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).