Intentions to Marry, 1898 January-June

Reference: Registrar-General of Births, Deaths and Marriages, Notices of intention to marry, Series 8937, R2840413, Archives New Zealand Te Rua Mahara o te Kāwanatanga, Wellington

Imaged by Luke at Archives NZ Wellington, June 27 2025

1898 is bound in two volumes, January-June and July-December.

Page 738

District of Wellington Quarter ending 30 June 1898

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
151	12 April 1898	John Schowstrand Bridget Bruton	John Schowstraud Bridget Bruton 💍 1898/1559	Bachelor Spinster	Carpenter	33 21	Eketahuna Dunedin	2 years 21 years	St Marys of the Angels Church, Boulcott Street, Wellington	98/1775	13 April 1898	Revd. John Ainsworth
152	12 April 1898	John Henry Thomas Isabella Dingwall	John Harry Thomas Isabella Dingnall 💍 1898/1576	Bachelor Spinster	Bootmaker	30 23	Wellington Wellington	7 years 8 months	House of Mrs Dingwall, 116 Taranaki Street, Wellington	98/1815	13 April 1898	Mr. Frank Hales
153	12 April 1898	Thomas Papps Annie O'Sullivan	Thomas Papps Annie O'Sullivan 💍 1898/1535	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer	31 34	Martinborough Martinborough	6 years 3 years	St Peter's Church, Wellington	98/1757	12 April 1898	Revd. W. C. Nater
154	12 April 1898	Andrew Nisbet Burns Bertha Rolff	Andrew Nisbet Burns Bertha Wolff 💍 1898/1577	Bachelor Spinster	Schoolmaster	25 27	Masterton Petone	9 months 3 years	St Augustine Church, Petone	98/1816	12 April 1898	Revd. J. D. Russell
155	12 April 1898	Edwin Goodwin Edith Christiesen	Edwin Goodwin Edith Christiesen 💍 1898/1551	Bachelor Spinster	Bootmaker	32 22	Eketahuna Eketahuna	7 months 2 years	House of Mr C. Goodwin, Rintoul Street, Wellington	98/1790	12 April 1898	Revd. A. C. Lawry
156	13 April 1898	Frank Paul Lucy Nuttall	Frank Paul Fanny Worsfold 💍 1899/489	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer	28 29	Palmerston North Wellington	5 years 1 year	House of Mr J. W. Bellamore, 29 Elizabeth Street, Wellington		13 April 1898	Revd. Wm. Bannber
157	13 April 1898	Alexander Lorimer Elizabeth Margaret McGill-Browne	Alexander Lorimer Elizabeth Margaret McGill Brown 💍 1898/2229	Bachelor Spinster	Draper	31 25	Auckland Wellington	1 year 1 year	House of Mr McGill-Browne, Macdonald Crescent, Wellington	98/2486	13 April 1898	Revd. James Paterson
158	14 April 1898	Arthur Cheesman Sarah Parrish	Arthur Cheesman Sarah Parrish 💍 1898/1554	Bachelor Spinster	Butcher	26 26	Wellington Wellington	4 years 7 years	Baptist Church, Wellington	98/1793	14 April 1898	Revd. Charles Dallast
160	14 April 1898	John Corrigan Ellen Dillon	John Corrigan Ellen Dillon 💍 1898/1566	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	28 21	Mangamahoe Wellington	6 years 3 years	St Mary's Cathedral, Wellington	98/1806	18 April 1898	Revd. Wm. Joseph Lewis
161	15 April 1898	Herbert Charles Ell Lenorah Dentice	Herbert Charles Ell Lenorah Dentice 💍 1898/1578	Bachelor Spinster	Salesman	28 25	Wellington Wellington	9 years 25 years	House of Leopold Dentice, Alpha Street, Wellington	98/1817	15 April 1898	Revd. Harry Blake Redstone

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 1898. More registers will be added when the Archives NZ Wellington reading room re-opens in September 2025.

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).