Intentions to Marry, 1900 January-June

Reference: Registrar-General of Births, Deaths and Marriages, Notices of intention to marry, Series 8937, R2840417, Archives New Zealand Te Rua Mahara o te Kāwanatanga, Wellington

Imaged by Luke at Archives NZ Wellington, September 12 2025

1900 is bound in two volumes, January-June and July-December.

Page 680

District of Hawera Quarter ending 30 June 1900 Registrar Wallace Stevens

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
351	12 April 1900	John Harrington Ellen Ewins	John Harrington Ellen Ewins 💍 1900/1195	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	36 25	Hawera Hawera	7 years 4 months	Roman Catholic Church, Hawera	00/1617		12 April 1900	Rev. P. J. Power, Hawera
352	16 April 1900	John Reid Alice Emily Bernard	John Reid Alice Emily Bernard 💍 1900/1193	Bachelor Spinster	Engineer	25 24	Petone Hawera	3 days	Registrar's Office, Hawera	00/1615		16 April 1900	The Registrar, Hawera
353	22 April 1900	Joseph O'Keefe Kate Jones	Joseph O'Keefe Kate Jones 💍 1900/1194	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	20 18	Inglewood Hawera	4 days 3 1/2 years	Registrar's Office	00/1616	George Jones	7 May 1900	The Registrar, Hawera
354	28 April 1900	John Dwyer Susan Frances Kelly	John Dwyer Susan Francis Kelly 💍 1900/1196	Bachelor Spinster	Contractor	38 21	Hawera Hawera	18 years 2 1/2 years	Roman Catholic Church, Hawera	00/1618		28 April 1900	Rev. P. J. Power, Hawera
355	26 May 1900	Charles Radford Sarah Best	Charles Radford Sarah Best 💍 1900/1199	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	30 22	Te Roti Te Roti	2 years 2 years	Residence of C. Martelli, Hawera	00/1621		26 May 1900	Rev. J. McDonald, Hawera
356	1 June 1900	Samuel Cornelius Deane Beatrice Pearson	Samuel Cornelius Deane Beatrice Pearson 💍 1900/1202	Bachelor Spinster	Asphaltor	31 21	Hawera Hawera	1 month 2 weeks	Residence of S. C. Deane, Hawera	00/1623		1 June 1900	Rev. J. McDonald, Hawera
357	23 June 1900	Donald Alexander Stewart Edith Alison Walker	Donald Alex Stewart Edith Alison Walker 💍 1900/1201	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	26 21	Normanby Normanby	7 years 19 years	Residence of A. R. Walker, Normanby	00/1622		23 June 1900	Rev. J. McDonald, Hawera

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).