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 826

District of Christchurch 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	Consent	Date of Certificate	Officiating Minister
271	9 June 1898	Eli George Handeven Jane Mabel Berry	Eli George Standeven Jane Mabel Berry 💍 1898/4069	Bachelor Spinster	Butcher	22 18	Christchurch Christchurch	22 years 18 years	House of Mr. P. C. Berry, Nursery Rd, Linwood	98/3272	Edmund Berry, Father	9 June 1898	Rev. H. L. C. Gilbert, Church of England
272	10 June 1898	Charles Edward Clarkson Jennie Smith Marshall	Charles Edward Clarkson Jennie Smith Marshall 💍 1898/2252	Bachelor Spinster	Tanner	25 24	Christchurch Woolston	5 years 17 years	Wesleyan Church	98/2534		10 June 1898	Rev. T. N. Newbold, Wesleyan
273	10 June 1898	Percy Henry Allan Pidgeon Olive Martha King	Henry Alan Pidgeon Olive Martha King 💍 1898/2719	Bachelor Spinster	Warehouseman Tailoress	22 20	Christchurch Avonside	8 years 5 years	Holy Trinity Church	98/2043	Agnes King, Mother	10 June 1898	Rev. W. A. Pascoe, Anglican
274	11 June 1898	William Webber Wilson Celia Eliza Gardner	William Webber Wilson Celia Eliza Gardner 💍 1898/2260	Bachelor Spinster	Compositor	35 18	Woolston Woolston	9 months 2 years	House of Mr. Wilson, St. Johns Rd, Woolston	98/2535	Arthur James Gardner, Father	11 June 1898	Rev. T. N. Newbold, Wesleyan
275	13 June 1898	Frederick William Kemp Maude Stewart	Frederick William Kemp Maude Stewart 💍 1898/2722 Frederick William Sprott Caroline Stewart 💍 1899/658	Bachelor Spinster	Sheep Farmer	28 18	Christchurch St. Albans	3 days 18 years	House of Rev. J. Tolamore, Clare Road	98/2066	James Stewart, Father	13 June 1898	Rev. J. Tolamore, Baptist
276	13 June 1898	William Thomas Coffin Violet Lilian Amielia Denford	William Thomas Coppin Violet Lilian Amelia Dunford 💍 1898/1717	Bachelor Spinster	Laborer	28 22	Christchurch Christchurch	3 days 3 days	Registrars Office	98/1960		13 June 1898	Registrar of Marriages, J. W. Patterson
277	13 June 1898	James Thomas Lucy Thomas	James Thomson Lucy Thomas 💍 1898/2717	Bachelor Spinster	Tailor Tailoress	26 25	Christchurch Sydenham	26 years 9 years	Primitive Methodist Church, Oxford Terrace	98/2000		13 June 1898	Rev. J. H. Lyons, Primitive Methodist

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).