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 772

District of Palmerston North Quarter ending 30 June 1900 Registrar Robt. St. Keeling

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
21	25 April 1900	Alfred Shearsby Ellen Barton	Alfred Shearsley Ellen Barton 💍 1900/1259	Widower Spinster	Horse Trainer	36 34	Palmerston North Palmerston North	4 years 4 years	At the office of the Registrar Palmerston North	00/1813		25 April 1900	Robt. St. Keeling, Registrar, Palmerston North
22	26 April 1900	Edward Joseph Keating Florence Irene Thorburn	Edward Joseph Keating Florence Irene Thorburn 💍 1900/1239	Bachelor Spinster	Railway Fireman Dressmaker	24 21	Palmerston North Palmerston North	3 years 5 years	At the house of A. Thorburn Palmerston North	00/1879		26 April 1900	Revd J. W. Newbold, Wesleyan Minister, Palmerston North
23	1 May 1900	Roland Todd Anderson Annie Reaburn Anderson	Roland Todd Annie Reaburn Anderson 💍 1900/1243	Widower Spinster	Ironmonger	42 30	Palmerston North Palmerston North	4 months 2 months	Wesleyan Church Broad Street Palmerston North	00/1823		1 May 1900	Revd S. Lawry, Wesleyan Minister, Palmerston North
24	8 May 1900	Arthur Edward Pritchard Isabella McBride	Arthur Edward Pritchard Isabella McBride 💍 1900/1244	Bachelor Spinster	Creamery Manager	22 20	Linton Linton	2 1/2 years 3 years	At the house of John Murphy Dr. McBride Linton	00/1834	John Murphy, M. Bride father	8 May 1900	Revd S. Lawry, Wesleyan Minister, Palmerston North
25	8 May 1900	William Jeffrey Wright Annie Elizabeth Wright	William Jeffrey Annie Elisabeth Wright 💍 1900/2898	Bachelor Spinster	Farm Manager	36 22	Beauhieu, Palmerston North Kumeroa, Woodville	6 weeks 15 years	St. David's Presbyterian Church Woodville	00/1740		8 May 1900	Revd H. J. Lewis, Presbyterian Minister, Woodville
26	14 May 1900	Walter William Robert Barr Jean McDonald Barr	Walter William Robert Jean McDonald Barr 💍 1900/3026	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer Embroiderer	40 31	Stoney Creek, Palmerston North Lower Hutt, Wellington	26 years 5 weeks	At the house of John Barr Lower Hutt	00/2027		14 May 1900	Revd Alexd. Gray, Presbyterian Minister, Lower Hutt

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).