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 570

District of Waihi Quarter ending 31 December 1894

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
35	3 October 1894	William Gardiner Margaret Ann Brown	William Gardiner Marget Ann Brown 💍 1897/3543 William Ernest Carter Margaret Agnes Brown 💍 1897/2992	Bachelor Spinster	Shopkeeper	25 24	Waihi Waihi	2 years 18 months Residence	Mr. Thomas Brown's	97/3815	13 October 1894	Rev. W. Woollass
36	24 October 1894	William Holloway Mary Samson	William Holloway Florence Mary Samson 💍 1897/2509	Bachelor Spinster	Miner	25 21	Waihi Waihi	12 months 12 months Residence	Mr. J. Foster	97/3816	24 October 1894	Rev. W. Woollass
37	24 December 1894	Daniel Williams Mary Jane Mileston	Daniel Williams Mary Ann Robinson Milestone 💍 1897/2517	Widower Widow	Miner	52 57	Waihi Waihi	6 months at the Registrar's Office 9 months Waihi Residence	Registrar's Office	97/3817	24 December 1894	Registrar
38	5 December 1894	John South Elizabeth Watt	John Welsh Elizabeth Abbott 💍 1897/3548 John Bennett Elizabeth Little 💍 1897/1609	Bachelor Widow	Miner	53 44	Waihi Waihi	3 years Farmers 8 months Waihi	St. John's Church	97/1034	9 December 1894	Staff Capt. John Cain
39	20 December 1894	John Thomas Earl Ada Grace Earl	John Thomas James Tilsley Ada Grace Earl 💍 1897/2528	Bachelor Spinster	Miner	24 22	Waihi Waihi	8 years St. John Church 4 years Waihi	St. John's Church	97/3818	21 December 1894	Rev. William Henry Wilson
40	22 December 1894	John Dalton Elizabeth Thomas	George Frank Easton Elizabeth Thomas 💍 1897/2208	Bachelor Spinster	Miner	24 20	Waihi Waihi	4 years St. John Church 2 years England Waihi	St. John's Church	97/3819	22 December 1894	Rev. William Henry Wilson
41	28 December 1894	Thomas Sherman Mary Ann Winston		Bachelor Spinster	Shopkeeper	26 25	Waihi Waihi	12 months Mr. James Dimkins 2 years Residence	Mr. James Dimkins	97/3820	28 December 1894	Rev. E. O. Woollass

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).