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 986

District of Dunedin Quarter ending 30 June 1900 Registrar W. Hall

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
236	19 June 1900	George Goshard Printy Elizabeth Scanlan	George Gospard Printaz Elizabeth Scanlan 💍 1900/1597	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	24 years 23 years	St Kilda St Kilda	3 days 9 years	In the house of James Patrick Scanlan	00/2503		19 June 1900	Revd James Coffey, Roman Catholic Priest
237	19 June 1900	George Joseph Carter Mary Ann Trinder	George Joseph Carter Mary Ann Trinder 💍 1900/3352	Bachelor Spinster	Brassfounder	29 years 26 years	Dunedin Dunedin	3 days 26 years	In St Joseph's Cathedral	00/1498		19 June 1900	Revd P. Murphy, Roman Catholic Priest
238	20 June 1900	Percy Earland Mary Anne Sarah Sheehan	Percy Crisp Earland Mary Anne Sarah Sheehan 💍 1900/1518	Bachelor Spinster	Blacksmith	23 years 23 years	Mornington Roslyn	11 years 11 years	In the Office of the Registrar of Marriages	00/2441		20 June 1900	W. Hall, Registrar of Marriages
239	20 June 1900	Albert Victor Bateman Anastatia Sheehan	Albert Victor Bateman Anastatia Sheehan 💍 1900/1519	Bachelor Spinster	Fireman	22 years 22 years	Kensington Roslyn	1 year 11 years	In the Office of the Registrar of Marriages	00/2442		20 June 1900	W. Hall, Registrar of Marriages
240	21 June 1900	David Spence Catherine Stirling	David Spence Catherine Stirling 💍 1900/4037	Bachelor Spinster	Carter	23 years 23 years	South Dunedin South Dunedin	8 years 23 years	In the house of David Stirling	00/3875		21 June 1900	Revd Isaac Jolly, Presbyterian Minister
241	22 June 1900	David Gray Lily May McLennan	David Gray Lily May McLennan 💍 1900/1489	Bachelor Spinster	Laborer	22 years 19 years	Dunedin Dunedin	12 years 19 years	In the house of Kenneth McLennan, Great King Street	00/1742	Kenneth McLennan, father of minor	22 June 1900	Revd W. Hewitson, Presbyterian Minister
242	22 June 1900	Thomas King Gertrude Tighe	Thomas King Gertrude Tighe 💍 1900/5829	Bachelor Spinster	Seaman	35 years 24 years	Dunedin Mornington	18 months 24 years	In the house of Mrs Catherine Tighe	00/2525		22 June 1900	Revd J. J. Lewis, Wesleyan Minister

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).