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 015

District of Auckland Quarter ending 31 March 1899

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
82	6 February 1899	Joseph Speak Jane Campbell	Joseph Speak Jane Campbell 💍 1899/51	Bachelor Spinster	Bushman	30 30	Auckland Coromandel	16yrs 4dys	Registrar's Office, Auckland	99/27		6 February 1899	J. Culpan, Deputy Registrar
83	6 February 1899	Cecil Harry Gilliland Rosetta Murphy	Cecil Harry Gilliland Rosetta Murphy 💍 1899/59	Bachelor Spinster	Carter	26 19	Auckland Auckland	16yrs 19yrs	Registrar's Office, Auckland	99/29	Felix Murphy, father	6 February 1899	J. Culpan, Deputy Registrar
84	6 February 1899	John James Healey Agnes Patilla Waller	John James Kealey Agnes Patilla Waller 💍 1899/430	Bachelor Spinster	Butcher	21 23	Auckland Auckland	21yrs 18yrs	St. David's Presbyterian Church, Auckland	99/165		6 February 1899	Rev. R. Scott West, Presbyterian
85	7 February 1899	Gustaf Ferdinand Lindblom Harriet Jackson	Gustof Ferdinand Lindblom Harriet Jackson 💍 1899/770	Bachelor Spinster	Mariner Dressmaker	23 21	Auckland Auckland	9mos 21yrs	House of Rev. R. Scott West, Mount Eden	99/672		7 February 1899	Rev. R. Scott West, Presbyterian
86	8 February 1899	James Laird Elizabeth Warwick	James Laird Elizabeth Warwick 💍 1899/62	Widower Widow	Settler	67 49	Wanganui Wanganui	30yrs 30yrs	Registrar's Office, Auckland	99/32		8 February 1899	J. Culpan, Deputy Registrar
87	8 February 1899	Francis Martin Margaret Smith	Francis Martin Margaret Smith 💍 1899/1557	Bachelor Spinster	Draftsman	30 23	Auckland Auckland	30yrs 2yrs	St. Benedict's Roman Catholic Church, Auckland	99/1360		8 February 1899	Very Rev. D. O. Egan, Roman Catholic
88	9 February 1899	John Willis Sarah Foster	John Willis Sarah Foster 💍 1899/145	Bachelor Spinster	Bootmaker Nurse	35 33	Auckland Auckland	30yrs 15yrs	House of Bridegroom, Epsom	99/95		9 February 1899	Rev. H. R. Dewsbury, Wesleyan
89	9 February 1899	Frederick William Cash Ethel May Gerrish	Frederick William Cash Ethel May Gerrish 💍 1899/159	Bachelor Spinster	Carter	26 21	Auckland Auckland	26yrs 20yrs	House of Mother of Bride, Mount Eden	99/103		9 February 1899	Rev. C. E. Ward, 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 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).