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 225

District of [illegible] Quarter ending 30 September 1891

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
207	8 August 1891	Enoch Thawley Alice Mary Ashton	Enoch Thawley Alice Mary Aston 💍 1898/3002	Bachelor Spinster	Carpenter	26 22	Wellington Wellington	12 years	Congregational Church, Courtenay Place	98/3000	8 August 1891	Rev. Wm. Simpson, Fernie
208	8 August 1891	Arthur Little Chapman Ada Isabella Smith		Bachelor Spinster	Builder	33 21	Johnsonville Wellington	11 years 11 years	House of Mr. Jenkins, Lambton Quay, Wellington	98/3659	8 August 1891	Rev. A. C. Hogg
209	8 August 1891	John Reide Susan Mahoney	John Reid Susan Mahoney 💍 1898/2497	Widower Widow	Labourer	48 41	Karori Wellington	7 years	Registrar's Office	98/2992	8 August 1891	Registrar
210	9 August 1891	Maurice Stark Martha Campbell	Maurice Stack Martha Campbell 💍 1898/2492	Bachelor Spinster	Storeman	31 26	Wellington Wellington	5 years 15 years	House of Mr. Campbell, 5 Vivian Street, Wellington	98/3010	9 August 1891	Rev. Wm. Bamford
211	9 August 1891	Charles Penney Maud Rebecca Routh	Charles Penney Maud Rebecca Russell 💍 1898/3003	Bachelor Spinster	Tailor	26 22	Rongotea Wellington	2 years 22 years	House of Mr. Routh, Tory Street, Wellington	98/3047	9 August 1891	Rev. Wm. F. Treme
212	11 August 1891	Ferdinand Rohde Rebecca Burgess	Ferdinand Rohde Catherine Burgess 💍 1898/2988	Widower Widow	Labourer	49 46	Wellington Wellington	17 years	House of Mr. Symberg, 22 Cuba Street, Wellington	98/3056	11 August 1891	Rev. Jas. Paterson
213	12 August 1891	William Hart Henrietta Hardcastle	William Hart Henrietta Hardcastle 💍 1898/3803	Bachelor Spinster	Rangefitter Tailoress	23 20	Wellington Wellington	13 years	House of Mr. Hardcastle, Alfred Street, Wellington	98/3028	12 August 1891	Rev. Wm. Shores
214	15 August 1891	Edward Joseph Carter Mary Ann Emerson	Edward Joseph Carter Mary Annie Sorenson 💍 1898/2498	Bachelor Spinster	Machinist	23 19	Wellington Wellington	5 years	Registrar's Office, Wellington	98/2993	15 August 1891	Registrar
215	15 August 1891	Frederick Charles Read Alice McGill		Bachelor Spinster	Butcher	25 19	Kaiwarra Kaiwarra	12 years	St. Peter's Church, Ghuznee Street, Wellington	98/3055	15 August 1891	Rev. John Devey
216	15 August 1891	John Stuart Kelly Maud Marian Cross	John Stewart Kelly Maude Marian Cross 💍 1898/4124	Bachelor Spinster	Journalist	26 24	Wellington Wellington	4 years 2 months	House of S. Cross, Wellington	98/3588	15 August 1891	Rev. C. S. Ogg

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).