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 979

District of Tokomairiro 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
793	12 April 1898	John William Spence Norah Kathleen Black	John William Spence Norah Kathleen Black 💍 1898/2750	Bachelor Spinster	Surveyor Home duties	27 27	Milton Milton	3 days 20 years	Ch England	98/2378	12 April 1898	J C Small
794	19 April 1898	John Grey Mabel Ashley Green	John Grey Mabel Ashley Green 💍 1898/1957	Widower Spinster	Farmer School Teacher	42 27	Circle Hill Milton Broad Bay Dunedin	12 years	Residence of Brides father Broad Bay	98/2400	19 April 1898	Thos J Brooke
795	7 May 1898	Andras Easton Robertson Rose Andrews	Andrew Easton Robertson Rose Andrews 💍 1898/2093	Bachelor Spinster	Storekeeper Home duties	26 26	Waihola Waihola	2 years 26 years	Residence of Brides father Waihola	98/2384	7 May 1898	Jas Somerville
796	7 May 1898	William Farquharson Jessie Bertram Hewitson	William Farquharson Jessie Bertram Hewitson 💍 1898/2090	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer Home duties	22 23	Lovells Flat Lovells Flat	3 years 23 years	Residence of Brides father Lovells Flat	98/2382	7 May 1898	P B Fraser
797	20 May 1898	John Wilkinson Madeleine Grey	John Wilkinson Madeleine Grey 💍 1898/2091	Bachelor Spinster	Solicitor Home duties	36 24	Dunedin Millburn	36 years 24 years	Residence of Brides Brother Millburn	98/2383	20 May 1898	Somerville
798	31 May 1898	Arthur William Foster Mary Ann Linton	Arthur William Foster Mary Ann Linton 💍 1898/2088	Bachelor Spinster	Factory Worker Home duties	29 21	Millburn Millburn	13 years 10 years	Residence of Mrs John Sutherland Millburn	98/2379	31 May 1898	J C Small
799	14 June 1898	Reginald Arthur Pyke Charlotte Howburgh Filburn	Reginald Arthur Pyke Charlotte Hosbourgh Lilburne 💍 1898/2751	Bachelor Spinster	Journalist Home duties	38 21	Milton Milton	2 years 21 years	Residence of Brides mother Milton	98/2380	14 June 1898	J C Small
800	16 June 1898	Thomas Scott Anna Melville Falconer	Thomas Scott Anna Melville Falconer 💍 1898/2089	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer Home duties	38 38	Crichton Clarkesville Milton	5 months 38 years	Residence of D and T Falconer Glenkenvie Milton	98/2381	16 June 1898	Samuel Currie

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).