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 370

District of Dunedin Quarter ending 30 September 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
231	9 July 1897	Edward Horatio Fountain Margaret Barclay	Edward Horatio Fountain Margaret Barclay 💍 1897/2239	Bachelor Spinster	Plasterer	26 years 21 years	Roslyn Dunedin	3 years 8 years	In the house of Revd James Gibb, Dunedin	97/3447		9 July 1897	Revd James Gibb, Presbyterian Minister
232	12 July 1897	Andrew Gulland Melville Catherine Smith Lees	Andrew Gulland Melville Catherine Smith Lees 💍 1897/2223	Bachelor Spinster	Clerk	30 years 28 years	St. Clair Roslyn	6 years 20 years	In the house of Andrew Lees, Roslyn	97/3448		12 July 1897	Revd R.R.M. Sutherland, Presbyterian Minister
233	12 July 1897	Archibald Leckie McKill Allison Brunton	Archibald Leckie McGill Allison Brunton 💍 1897/2267	Bachelor Spinster	Dredgemaster	37 years 34 years	Dunedin South Dunedin	3 days 3 days	In the house of Isaac Jolly, South Dunedin	97/3471		12 July 1897	Revd Isaac Jolly, Presbyterian Minister
234	13 July 1897	Robert Dickson Roderick Emma Catherine Osborne	Robert Dickison Emma Catherine Osborne 💍 1897/2364	Bachelor Spinster	Bootmaker	22 years 19 years	Dunedin South Dunedin	22 years 19 years	In the house of Ephraim Osborne, South Dunedin	97/3609	Ephraim Osborne, father of minor	13 July 1897	Revd R. J. Porter, Presbyterian Minister
235	13 July 1897	William McKenzie Mary Sutherland McKay Innes Ross	Frederick McKenzie Mary Sutherland McKay Sneddon Ross 💍 1897/2232	Bachelor Spinster	Cycle Manufacturer	30 years 24 years	Dunedin Hooper's Inlet	1 week 4 years	In the house of William Ross, Hooper's Inlet	97/3458		13 July 1897	Revd A. Greig, Presbyterian Minister
236	13 July 1897	John Chettle Palmer Eliza Hudson	John Chettle Palmer Eliza Hudson 💍 1897/2243	Bachelor Spinster	Bootmaker	24 years 23 years	Caversham Caversham	22 years 22 years	In the house of Revd William Saunders, Dunedin	97/3446		13 July 1897	Revd William Saunders, Congregational Minister
237	14 July 1897	George Frank Easton Elizabeth Thomas	George Frank Easton Elizabeth Thomas 💍 1897/2208	Bachelor Spinster	Seaman	29 years 23 years	Dunedin Dunedin	22 years 22 years	In Knox Church, Dunedin	97/3432		14 July 1897	Revd W. Hewitson, Presbyterian Minister
238	14 July 1897	Edmond Connors Johanna Spillane	Edmond Connors Johanna Spillane 💍 1897/2263	Widower Spinster	Painter	64 years 33 years	South Dunedin South Dunedin	20 years 12 years	In St. Patrick's Church, South Dunedin	97/3467		14 July 1897	Revd D. O'Neill, Roman Catholic Priest

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).