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 836

District of Dunedin 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
313	19 October 1897	John McIntyre Mary Ann Kennedy	John McIntyre Mary Ann Kennedy 💍 1897/3268	Bachelor Spinster	Police Constable	33 years 28 years	Dunedin South Dunedin	6 years 16 years	In the house of James Kennedy, South Dunedin	97/4801		19 October 1897	Revd P. O'Neill, Roman Catholic Priest
314	19 October 1897	Thomas James Meade Johanna Josephine Ryan	Thomas James Meade Johanna Josephine Ryan 💍 1897/3269	Bachelor Spinster	Telegraphist	32 years 30 years	South Dunedin St Kilda	16 years 18 years	In St Patrick's Church, South Dunedin	97/4802		19 October 1897	Revd P. O'Neill, Roman Catholic Priest
315	20 October 1897	Alfred Thomas Ayers Sarah Jane Anderson	Alfred Thomas Ayers Sarah Jane Anderson 💍 1897/3248	Bachelor Spinster	Engine Driver	19 years 33 years	North East Valley Dunedin	3 years 4 years	In the house of Thomas McKernon, Union Street, Dunedin	97/4803	Alfred Ayers, father of Minor	20 October 1897	Revd T. Laycock, Methodist Minister
316	20 October 1897	Hans Mars Hansen Eliza Barron	Hans Mars Hansen Eliza Barron 💍 1897/2923	Bachelor Spinster	Ploughman	19 years 21 years	Dunedin Dunedin	10 days 5 weeks	In the Office of the Registrar of Marriages, Dunedin	97/4363	Hans Jacob Hansen, father of Minor	20 October 1897	W. J. Hall, Registrar of Marriages
317	21 October 1897	Harry James Lucas Florence Counter	Harry James Lucas Florence Counter 💍 1897/3095	Bachelor Spinster	Carpenter	29 years 21 years	Dunedin Dunedin	24 years 2 years	In St Paul's Cathedral, Dunedin	97/4589		21 October 1897	Revd G. Robinson, Church of England Minister
318	25 October 1897	Carl Herman Pistor Catherine Elizabeth Thomas	Carl Herman Pistor Catherine Elizabeth Thomas 💍 1897/3167	Bachelor Spinster	Ironmonger	23 years 25 years	Dunedin Dunedin	22 years 19 years	In St Joseph's Cathedral, Dunedin	97/4692		25 October 1897	Revd P. Murphy, Roman Catholic Priest
319	25 October 1897	William Briggs McKane Minnie Mare	William Briggs McMillan Minnie Ware 💍 1897/3362	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	27 years 24 years	Brockville Abbotsford	3 years 12 years	In the house of Revd Robert Rose, McKay Sutherland, Roslyn	97/4911		25 October 1897	Revd R. R. M. Sutherland, Presbyterian Minister

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).