Intentions to Marry, 1900 July-December

Reference: Registrar-General of Births, Deaths and Marriages, Notices of intention to marry, Series 8937, R2840418, Archives New Zealand Te Rua Mahara o te Kāwanatanga, Wellington

Imaged by Carole at Archives NZ Wellington, September 12 2025

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

Page 426

District of Dunedin Quarter ending 30 September 1900 Registrar W. J. Scall

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
286	25 July 1900	Alexander Rowley Edith Swan Park	Alexander Rowley Edith Susan Sarah Annie McKenzie Urquhart 💍 1900/5032	Bachelor Spinster	Ironmoulder	21 22	Caversham Caversham	17 years 10 years	In the Presbyterian Church, Caversham	00/5338		25 July 1900	Revd D. Dutton, Presbyterian Minister
287	28 July 1900	Charles Thomas Sullivan Mabel Cornelia Suckling	Charles Thomas Sullivan Mabel Cornelia Suckling 💍 1900/4225	Bachelor Spinster	Clerk	37 24	Burnside Dunedin	5 months 6 months	In the house of Revd William Saunders, Dunedin	00/3896		28 July 1900	Revd W. Saunders, Congregational Minister
288	28 July 1900	Robert Roberts Thomasina Hornsby	Robert Roberts Thomasina Hornsby 💍 1900/4046	Bachelor Spinster	Butcher	21 23	Brockville Mornington	3 days 9 months	In the house of William Roberts, Brockville	00/3861		28 July 1900	Revd R. K. Sutherland, Presbyterian Minister
289	1 August 1900	Samuel Bolton Alice Tate	Samuel Bolton Alice Tate 💍 1900/3979	Bachelor Spinster	Laborer	26 19	Dunedin Dunedin	3 days 3 days	In the Office of the Registrar of Marriages, Dunedin	00/3793	Thomas Dawson Tate, father of minor	1 August 1900	W. J. Scall, Registrar of Marriage
290	1 August 1900	George Thomas West Isabella Ryle	George Thomas West Isabella Kyle 💍 1900/4038	Bachelor Spinster	Carter	21 21	South Dunedin South Dunedin	10 years 18 years	In the house of Mrs Catherine Ryle, South Dunedin	00/3876		1 August 1900	Revd Isaac Jolly, Presbyterian Minister
291	1 August 1900	Augustus Horne Kate Crane	Augustus Garne Kate Crane 💍 1900/4009	Bachelor Spinster	Ironmoulder	32 33	Dunedin Dunedin	25 years 7 years	In St. Joseph's Cathedral, Dunedin	00/3848		1 August 1900	Revd P. Murphy, Roman Catholic Priest
292	2 August 1900	James Wilkinson Sarah Wright	James Wilkinson Sarah Wright 💍 1900/3980 Peter Mortensen Sarah Wright 💍 1900/5000	Bachelor Spinster	Laborer	35 21	Green Island Green Island	8 years 4 years	In the Office of the Registrar of Marriages, Dunedin	00/3794		2 August 1900	W. J. Scall, Registrar of Marriage

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).