Intentions to Marry, 1899 July-December

Reference: Registrar-General of Births, Deaths and Marriages, Notices of intention to marry, Series 8937, R2840416, Archives New Zealand Te Rua Mahara o te Kāwanatanga, Wellington

Imaged by Carole 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 019

District of Auckland Quarter ending 30 September 1899 Registrar E. H. Lyons

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
520	25 August 1899	Harold Edward Martin Mary Ann Daniel	Harold Edward Martin Mary Ann Daniel 💍 1899/3208	Bachelor Spinster	Bootmaker	25 19	Auckland Auckland	25 years 2 years	St Paul's Church, Auckland	99/3118	Catherine Daniel, Mother	25 August 1899	Rev. C. M. Nelson, Church of England
521	25 August 1899	Frederick Daniel McNamara Jane Lindsay	Frederick Daniel McNamara Jane Lindsay 💍 1899/3863	Bachelor Spinster	Bootmaker	26 23	Auckland Auckland	26 years 23 years	Church of England, Takapuna	99/3853		25 August 1899	Rev. S. Hawthorne, Church of England
522	25 August 1899	Latimer Clark Hannah Maud Bayly	Latimer Clark Hannah Maude Bayly 💍 1899/3076	Bachelor Spinster	Pipe Maker	30 33	Hobsonville Hobsonville	1 year 4 days	House of Mother of Bridegroom, Hobsonville	99/2927		25 August 1899	Rev. A. Maclean, Presbyterian
523	25 August 1899	John Hatton Scott Emma Chester	John Hatton Scott Emma Chester 💍 1899/3085	Widower Widow	Machinist	78 53	Auckland Auckland	18 years 10 years	House of Bridegroom, College Road	99/2935		25 August 1899	Rev. J. Parker, Congregational
524	25 August 1899	Charles Ambrose Dixon Nellie Samson	Charles Ambrose Dixon Nellie Lawson 💍 1899/2845	Bachelor Spinster	Groom	25 21	Auckland Auckland	25 years 3 months	Registrar's Office, Auckland	99/2838		25 August 1899	E. H. Lyons, Registrar
525	26 August 1899	Thomas Clark Agnes Baillie	Thomas Clark Agnes Baillie 💍 1899/2837	Widower Widow	Settler	36 43	Henderson	9 years 16 years	Registrar's Office, Auckland	99/2837		26 August 1899	E. H. Lyons, Registrar

These records have been automatically transcribed and must be verified using the page image (below)

100% Contrast

100% Brightness

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).