Intentions to Marry, 1897 July-December

Reference: Registrar-General of Births, Deaths and Marriages, Notices of intention to marry, Series 8937, R2840412, Archives New Zealand Te Rua Mahara o te Kāwanatanga, Wellington

Imaged by Carole at Archives NZ Wellington, June 25 2025

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

Page 484

District of Auckland Quarter ending 31 December 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
695	18 December 1897	Dennis Rupert Havell Agnes Gray Allan	Dennis Rupert Flavell Agnes Allan Craig 💍 1897/284	Bachelor Spinster	School Teacher	31 33	Auckland Auckland	6 years 33 years	House of Mother of Bride, Symonds Street	97/4654		18 December 1897	Rev. R. J. Macnicol, Presbyterian
696	20 December 1897	William John Parker Susan Rail	William John Parker Susan Rail 💍 1897/2405	Bachelor Spinster	Saddler	22 17	Auckland Auckland	22 years 4 years	Registrars Office	97/3700	Albert Rail, Father	20 December 1897	E. Athyons, Registrar
697	20 December 1897	John Dellicar Amy Alice Bunting	John Dillicar Amy Alice Bunting 💍 1897/269	Bachelor Spinster	Settler	29 26	Whakatane Auckland	2 years 2 years	House of Mr. Maidlow, Karaka Street, Newton	97/4662		20 December 1897	Rev. C. E. Ward, Primitive Methodist
698	20 December 1897	James Brushe Heedman Phoebe Frey		Bachelor Spinster	School Teacher	34 21	Auckland Auckland	15 months 2 weeks	House of Mr. Ralph, Sylvia Park, Otahuhu	97/4826		20 December 1897	Rev. J. Hill, Presbyterian
699	21 December 1897	Walter Legge Edith Legge	Walter Legge Edith Legge 💍 1897/339	Bachelor Spinster	Bushman	36 24	Whangapoua Auckland	4 months 7 years	House of Mr. Huidgley, Fitzroy Street, Ponsonby	97/3726		21 December 1897	Rev. A. Peters, Wesleyan
700	21 December 1897	Alfred Bray Eleanor Hamerton	Alfred Bray Eleanor Hamerton 💍 1897/268	Bachelor Spinster	Produce Merchant	25 25	Auckland Auckland	8 years 4 years	Presbyterian Church	97/4661		21 December 1897	Rev. J. B. Monro, Presbyterian
701	21 December 1897	Frank William Coburn Martha Fairley	Frank William Coburn Martha Fairley 💍 1897/3190	Bachelor Spinster	Blacksmith	24 19	Whangarei Auckland	10 years 18 months	House of John Fairley, Turner Street, Auckland	97/4711	John Fairley, father	21 December 1897	Rev. C. E. Ward, Primitive Methodist
702	21 December 1897	William James Brady Angelina White	William James Brady Angelina White 💍 1897/2441	Bachelor Spinster	Teacher Music	30 24	Auckland Auckland	30 years 9 years	Roman Catholic Church, Howick	97/3717		21 December 1897	Very Rev. K. Mac Donald, Roman Catholic
703	22 December 1897	Walter Hayter Broom Christina Broom	Walter Hayter Christina Broom 💍 1897/2407	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer	25 19	Bay of Islands Auckland	7 months 8 months	Registrars Office	97/3701	Christina Broom, mother	22 December 1897	E. Athyons, Registrar
704	22 December 1897	John Thomas Core Emily Elizabeth Dowd	John Thomas Cox Emily Elizabeth Dowd 💍 1897/3191	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer	26 23	Auckland Auckland	22 years 23 years	House of Father of Bride, Anglesea Street	97/4715		22 December 1897	Rev. C. E. Ward, Primitive Methodist

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 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).