Intentions to Marry, 1898 July-December

Reference: Registrar-General of Births, Deaths and Marriages, Notices of intention to marry, Series 8937, R2840414, Archives New Zealand Te Rua Mahara o te Kāwanatanga, Wellington

Imaged by Carole at Archives NZ Wellington, June 27 2025

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

Page 494

District of Auckland Quarter ending 31 December 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
724	28 December 1898	James Valentine Wilhilmina Agnes Prussing	James Valentine Wilhelmina Agnes Prussong 💍 1898/4242	Bachelor Not heard of former husband	Clerk	26 37	Auckland Auckland	5 months 4 days	Registrar's Office, Auckland	98/3786		28 December 1898	J. Culpan, Deputy Registrar
725	28 December 1898	Charles Thomas Barrett Brown Sarah Stitt	Charles Thomas Banett Brown Sarah Still 💍 1898/4978	Bachelor Spinster	Miner	20 20	Waihi Auckland	6 years 20 years	House of Father of Bride, Abercrombie Street, Auckland	98/5066	John Thomas Brown, father; Mary Stitt, mother	28 December 1898	Rev. C. E. Ward, Primitive Methodist
726	28 December 1898	Frederick Smith Frances Hartnoll	Frederick Smith Frances Hartnoll 💍 1898/4253	Bachelor Widow	Painter	33 37	Auckland Auckland	2 years 21 years	Registrar's Office, Auckland	98/3787		28 December 1898	J. Culpan, Deputy Registrar
727	28 December 1898	John McQuindan Mary Kennedy	John McQuinlan Mary Kennedy 💍 1898/5120 Andrew Mundz Mary Kennedy 💍 1898/3050	Bachelor Spinster	Mill hand	27 23	Mercury Bay Auckland	15 years 23 years	St. Benedict's Church, Auckland	98/4931		28 December 1898	Rev. M. Brodie, Roman Catholic
728	28 December 1898	James Francis Sansery Mary Way	James Francis Sauslay Mary Way 💍 1898/2530	Bachelor Spinster	Mariner	25 18	Auckland Auckland	12 years 18 years	House of Father of Bride, Chelsea	98/3870	William Way, father	28 December 1898	Rev. J. Walter, Auckland Central Mission
729	28 December 1898	Thomas Todd Jessie Davies	Thomas Todd Jessie Davies 💍 1898/4302	Bachelor Spinster	Potter	36 29	Invercargill Auckland	20 years 29 years	Church of Christ, Ponsonby Road	98/3833		28 December 1898	Mr. T. J. Bull, Church of Christ
730	28 December 1898	Ernest William Mills Annie Burdie Perrin	Ernest William Mills Annie Purdie Perrin 💍 1899/205	Bachelor Spinster	Mariner	28 22	Onehunga Onehunga	10 years 10 years	Church of the Holy Sepulchre, Auckland	99/133		28 December 1898	Rev. J. A. Kayll, Church of England
731	28 December 1898	John McFarland Catherine Stevenson	John McFarland Catherine Stevenson 💍 1898/5136	Bachelor Widow	Labourer	25 26	Cambridge Auckland	24 years 5 years	House of Mr. W. D. Anderson, Eaton Terrace	98/4922		28 December 1898	Rev. R. Scott West, Presbyterian
732	28 December 1898	William McFarland Sarah Ford	William McFarland Sarah Ford 💍 1898/5137	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer	34 21	Cambridge Cambridge	24 years 5 years	House of Mr. W. D. Anderson, Eaton Terrace	98/4923		28 December 1898	Rev. R. Scott West, Presbyterian

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).