Intentions to Marry, 1901 South Island

Reference: Registrar-General of Births, Deaths and Marriages, Notices of intention to marry, Series 8937, R2840420, Archives New Zealand Te Rua Mahara o te Kāwanatanga, Wellington

Imaged by Carole at Archives NZ Wellington, September 22 2025

1901 is bound in two volumes, North Island districts and South Island districts.

Page 786

District of Invercargill Quarter ending 31 March 1901 Registrar John Logan Bush

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
1	4 January 1901	Thomas Guilburn Rose Mansfield	Thomas Milburn Rose Mansfield 💍 1901/953	Bachelor Spinster	Blacksmith	27 26	Invercargill Invercargill	3 months 4 days	House of Rev J. a. Lusford, North Road, Invercargill	01/1271		4 January 1901	Rev J. a. Lusford
2	9 January 1901	George Henry Preston Bridget Sarah Butler	George Henry Preston Bridget Sarah Butler 💍 1901/6177	Bachelor Spinster	Seaman	31 23	Invercargill Invercargill	1 week 3 years	St Marys Church, Clyde Street, Invercargill	01/1287		9 January 1901	Rev Wm Burke
3	14 January 1901	George Ironman Elizabeth Fraser	George Norman Elizabeth Fraser 💍 1901/778	Bachelor Spinster	Farm Laborer	35 23	Invercargill Invercargill	4 days 4 days	Office of Registrar of Marriages, Invercargill	01/1814		14 January 1901	J. L. Bush, Registrar
4	14 January 1901	John Gilkison Maggie Thomson	John Gilkison Maggie Thomson 💍 1901/793	Bachelor Spinster	Auctioneer	26 24	Invercargill Invercargill	22 years 15 years	House of Mr John Thomson, Eye Street, Invercargill	01/1228		14 January 1901	Rev Geo Lindsay
5	14 January 1901	William John Ridland Susan Mary Sutton	William John Redland Susan Mary Sutton 💍 1901/973	Bachelor Spinster	Draper	30 29	Bluff Invercargill	3 years 17 years	House of Susan Mary Sutton, South Invercargill	01/1238		14 January 1901	Rev Wm Burke
6	15 January 1901	Alexander McLaggan Janet Todd Weir	Alexander McLaggan Janet Todd Weir 💍 1901/951	Bachelor Spinster	Dredge Hand	24 23	Invercargill Invercargill	3 days 10 years	House of Mr Alex Rennie, Teviot Street, Invercargill	01/1230		15 January 1901	Rev Geo Lindsay
7	17 January 1901	James McKinnon Catherine Cook	James McKinnon Catherine Cook 💍 1901/779	Bachelor Spinster	Laborer	28 26	South Forest Hill Makarewa	28 years 10 years	Office of Registrar of Marriages, Invercargill	01/1715		17 January 1901	J. L. Bush, Registrar
8	18 January 1901	Thomas Joseph Guthee Mary Maud McLeay	Thomas Joseph McPhee Mary Shand McLeay 💍 1901/792	Bachelor Spinster	Sawmill Hand	20 17	Long Bush Kennington	20 years 17 years	House of Mr John McLeay, Kennington	01/1227	Annie McLeay, Mother. John McLeay, Father.	18 January 1901	Rev Evan Bissett

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 1901. 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).