Intentions to Marry, 1899 January-June

Reference: Registrar-General of Births, Deaths and Marriages, Notices of intention to marry, Series 8937, R2840415, Archives New Zealand Te Rua Mahara o te Kāwanatanga, Wellington

Imaged by Luke at Archives NZ Wellington (now located in the National Library reading room), September 5 2025

1899 is bound in two volumes, January-June and July-December.

Page 309

District of Christchurch Quarter ending 31 March 1899 Registrar J. Patterson

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
45	25 January 1899	John Duthie Back Laura Rogers	John Duthie Laura Rogers 💍 1899/933	Bachelor Spinster	Accountant	28 26	Christchurch Opawa	28 years 26 years	St. Marks Church	99/821	25 January 1899	Ven Arch Cholmondeley, Anglican
46	27 January 1899	John Shier Matilda McRae	John Shier Matilda McRae 💍 1899/648	Bachelor Widow	Jeweller	28 37	Christchurch Christchurch	17 years 37 years	Registrar's Office	99/729	27 January 1899	Registrar Morrison
47	28 January 1899	William Fraser Mary Jessie Stevens	William Fraser Mary Jessie Steven 💍 1899/868	Widower Spinster	Grain Merchant	67 39	Christchurch Linwood	30 years 15 years	House of Mr. J. Stevens	99/756	28 January 1899	Rev. J. Orchard, Wesleyan
48	28 January 1899	Cecil Wilson Alice Ethel Julius	Cecil Wilson Alice Ethel Julius 💍 1899/3563	Bachelor Spinster	Bishop of Melanesia	38 21	Christchurch Christchurch	1 month 9 years	Cathedral	99/3542	28 January 1899	Very Rev. Dean Jacobs, Anglican
49	31 January 1899	Alfred James Todd Alice May Pattrick	Alfred James Dodd Alice Mary Pattrick 💍 1899/875	Bachelor Spinster	Bootmaker Domestic	22 22	Christchurch Christchurch	2 years 4 months	House of Wm. Sullivan, Polambo Road, Christchurch	99/757	31 January 1899	Rev. J. Orchard, Wesleyan
50	31 January 1899	William Francis Tait Annie Gertrude Lake	William Francis Tait Annie Gertrude Lake 💍 1899/850	Bachelor Spinster	Traveller	31 23	Christchurch Christchurch	31 years 23 years	St. Michaels Church	99/782	31 January 1899	Rev. A. W. Averill, Anglican
51	31 January 1899	William Wade Daly Christina Mary Hibbs	William Bede Daly Christina Mary Stibbs 💍 1899/1160	Bachelor Spinster		38 30	Christchurch Christchurch	4 months 1 week	St. Mary's Church, Manchester Street	99/1204	31 January 1899	Rev. M. Marnane, Roman Catholic

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 1899. More registers are being added almost every week.

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).