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 928

District of Dunedin Quarter ending 31 December 1899 Registrar Wm Call

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
407	20 October 1899	Richard Benjamin Hill Jane Emily Wilkinson-Bezett	Richard Benjamin Hill Jane Emily Wilkinson Bergett 💍 1899/4161	Bachelor Spinster	Carrier	27 years 20 years	Caversham St Kilda	5 years 14 years	In St Peters Church, Caversham	99/4998	Edwin P. Bezett, Father of minor	30 October 1899	Revd B M King, Church of England Minister
408	30 October 1899	Robert Matheson Robertson Catherine McLeod	Robert Matheson Robertson Catherine McLeod 💍 1899/4156	Bachelor Spinster	Clerk	30 years 27 years	Palmerston Dunedin	8 years 3 days	In the house of Revd James Gibb, Dunedin	99/4993		30 October 1899	Revd James Gibb, Presbyterian Minister
409	30 October 1899	Percy William Peters Kathleen Margaret Hawkins	Percy William Peters Kathleen Margaret Hawkins 💍 1899/4151	Bachelor Spinster	Warehouseman	26 years 26 years	Dunedin Dunedin	19 years 18 years	In the house of Charles William Hawkins, George Street, Dunedin	99/5038		30 October 1899	Revd A North, Baptist Minister
410	31 October 1899	Charles Thomas Bates Ellen Catherine Drake	Charles Thomas Bates Ellen Catherine Drake 💍 1899/5310	Bachelor Spinster	Laborer	25 years 29 years	Mornington Mornington	1 year 3 years	In the house of John Kirk, Roslyn	99/5186		31 October 1899	Revd R M Sutherland, Presbyterian Minister
411	31 October 1899	Arthur Lindsay Forbes Ledger Meta Charlotte Denny	Arthur Lindsay Forbes Ledger Meta Charlotte Denny 💍 1899/4162	Bachelor Spinster	Clerk	33 years 27 years	Dunedin St Clair	3 days 15 years	In St Peters Church, Caversham	99/4999		31 October 1899	Revd B M King, Church of England Minister
412	1 November 1899	Henry Percy Norris Eva Cluttening	Henry Percy Norris Eva Hutchings 💍 1899/5070	Bachelor Spinster	Steward	34 years 24 years	Dunedin Dunedin	3 years 24 years	In the house of Mrs Thurza Fitching, Maclaggan Street, Dunedin	99/4967		1 November 1899	Revd W A Sinclair, Wesleyan Minister
413	1 November 1899	Harry Alfred Robinson Julia Beck	Harry Alfred Robinson Julia Beck 💍 1899/5232	Bachelor Spinster	Manufacturer	25 years 24 years	Dunedin Dunedin	5 years 10 years	In St Pauls Cathedral, Dunedin	99/5373		1 November 1899	Revd C G Robinson, Church of England Minister

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).