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 681

District of Wellington 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
370	1 October 1897	Lancelot Couther Mary Ellen French		Bachelor Spinster	Locomotive Fireman	26 24	Wellington Wellington	12 years 11 years	House of Mr. Moran	97/4745		1 October 1897	Rev. George Henry Mann
371	1 October 1897	John Haislock Ellast Mary Ellen Spindler	John Waistell Ellwood Mary Ellen French 💍 1897/2630	Widower Spinster	Baker	34 24	Wellington Wellington	4 years 5 years	Wesleyan Parsonage	97/3945		1 October 1897	Rev. William Bannister
372	1 October 1897	Charles Orr Mahalia Rowe	Charles Orr Mahalia Reeve 💍 1897/2655	Bachelor Spinster	Carpenter	28 22	Wellington Wellington	1 year 22 years	House of Mrs. Simms	97/3971		2 October 1897	Rev. Alexander Thompson
373	2 October 1897	Robert Ponton Janet Miller	Robert Pointon Janet Miller 💍 1897/3074	Bachelor Spinster	Machinist	23 20	Petone Petone	9 years 20 years	House of James Miller	97/4568	James Miller	5 October 1897	Rev. Andrew Gray
374	5 October 1897	Arthur Ernest Brown Esther Martha Pritchard	Arthur Ernest Brown Esther Martha Beatrice Russell 💍 1897/3215	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	27 24	Naiwetu Nai Nai	27 years 24 years	House of William Russell	97/4741		5 October 1897	Rev. John Reed Glasson
375	5 October 1897	Charles Henry Jenkins Lydia Wood Lindsay	Charles Henry Jenkins Cecilia Wood Lindsay 💍 1897/2610	Bachelor Spinster	Railway Fireman	26 27	Wellington Wellington	4 years 27 years	House of Mr. Lindsay	97/3922		9 October 1897	Rev. Thomas Gordon Dawson
376	6 October 1897	Michael O'Shea Hannah Kearney	Michael O'Shea Hannah Kearney 💍 1897/2602	Bachelor Widow	Labourer Storekeeper	35 39	Wellington Wellington	3 years 22 years	St. Mary's Cathedral	97/3919		6 October 1897	Rev. James Paterson
377	6 October 1897	John Henry Salmon Annie Louisa Harper	John Henry Salmon Annie Keren Thompson 💍 1897/306	Bachelor Spinster	Grainer	31 27	Wellington Wellington	4 years 27 years	St. John's Manse	97/4746		6 October 1897	Rev. Charles Simmons Ogg
378	6 October 1897	Wong Sing Ada Margaret Gilbert	Wong Sing Ada Margaret Giles 💍 1897/3289	Bachelor Spinster	Storekeeper	29 21	Wellington Wellington	3 years 21 years	House of Joseph Gibbs	97/4852		6 October 1897	Rev. Charles Simmons Ogg
379	6 October 1897	John McDonald Minnie Capell	John Ross Macdonald Minnie Capele 💍 1897/2621	Bachelor Divorced	Clerk	28 31	Wellington Wellington	5 years 6 years	House of H. G. Elliott	97/3956		6 October 1897	Rev. James Kennedy Elliott

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).