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 885

District of Oamaru Quarter ending 30 June 1901 Registrar Robert Percy Ward

No	Date of Notice	Names and Surnames of Parties	BDM Match	Condition	Calling or Profession	Age	Dwelling Place	Length of Residence	Marriage Place	Folio	Date of Certificate	Officiating Minister
2132	2 April 1901	Albert Slater Marjory Bella Dawson	Albert Slater Marjory Bella Dawson 💍 1901/2660	Bachelor Spinster	Plumber	23 21	Oamaru Oamaru	3 days 21 years	Residence of Mr William Dawson	01/2900	2 April 1901	Rev. S. D. Box
2133	2 April 1901	John Sullivan Kate Matilda Comyn	John Sullivan Kate Matilda Comyn 💍 1901/2427	Bachelor Spinster	Labourer Housemaid	27 31	Oamaru Dunedin	27 years 31 years	Roman Catholic Cathedral	01/2735	2 April 1901	Rev. Patrick Murphy
2134	4 April 1901	Harry Arnold Mena Bennett	Harry Arnold Mena Bennett 💍 1901/3733	Bachelor Spinster	Bricklayer	26 23	Oamaru Oamaru	3 days 23 years	Residence of Mr Richard Bennett	01/4211	4 April 1901	Rev. Josiah Ward
2135	10 April 1901	Malcolm McLeod Elizabeth Appleby	Malcolm McLeod Elizabeth Appleby 💍 1901/6081	Bachelor Spinster	Rabbit Inspector	33 23	Oamaru Oamaru	4 days 4 days	St Lukes Church	01/2905	10 April 1901	Rev. E Fynes-Clinton
2136	16 April 1901	James Gordon McKay Jessie Mailer Reid	James Gordon McKay Janet Mailer Reid 💍 1901/2661 James Bradley Jessie Mabel Reid 💍 1901/3397	Bachelor Spinster	Farmer	30 23	Ngapara Ngapara	10 years 23 years	Residence of Mr Thomas Reid	01/2901	16 April 1901	Rev. James Standring
2137	23 April 1901	Harold Francis Sherwood King Olive Decima Bennett	Harold Francis Sherwood King Olive Decima Bennett 💍 1901/2470	Bachelor Spinster	Reporter Dressmaker	28 21	Oamaru Oamaru	4 months 21 years	Office of Registrar of Marriages	01/2894	23 April 1901	Registrar of Marriages, Oamaru
2138	24 April 1901	William Southgate Ellen Gordon	William Southgate Ellen Gordon 💍 1901/2471	Bachelor Spinster	Police Constable Domestic Servant	27 22	Oamaru Oamaru	5 days 5 days	Residence of Mr Robert Gordon, Eden Street, Oamaru	01/2895	24 April 1901	Rev. R. J. Porter

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).