Intentions to Marry, 1918 Aria to Hunterville

Reference: Registrar-General of Births, Deaths and Marriages, Notices of intention to marry, Series 8937, R2840477, Archives New Zealand Te Rua Mahara o te Kāwanatanga, Wellington

1918 is bound in six volumes (a to f) with continuous page numbers. Each volume contains a different set of districts, going from north to south.

1918c contains pages 865-1248, covering districts from Aria to Hunterville

Page 903

District of Kaponga Quarter ending 30 June 1918 Registrar A. Howard

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

2 April 1918

Colin Sinclair Walker
Julia Geary

Colin Sinclair Walker
Julia Geary
💍 1918/2995

Widower
Spinster

Builder
Domestic Duties

44
22

Kaponga
Opunake

22 years
22 years

St Barnabas Church Opunake

2612

2 April 1918

Rev Herbert A. Walke, Anglican

No	4
Date of Notice	2 April 1918
	Groom	Bride
Names of Parties	Colin Sinclair Walker	Julia Geary
	💍 1918/2995
Condition	Widower	Spinster
Profession	Builder	Domestic Duties
Age	44	22
Dwelling Place	Kaponga	Opunake
Length of Residence	22 years	22 years
Marriage Place	St Barnabas Church Opunake
Folio	2612
Consent
Date of Certificate	2 April 1918
Officiating Minister	Rev Herbert A. Walke, Anglican

21 May 1918

Jacob Kandrup Moller
Mary Franks

Jacob Randrup Moller
Mary Franks
💍 1918/2986

Bachelor
Spinster

Factory Manager
Domestic Duties

26
20

Riverlea
Riverlea

16 years
9 years

St Marks Church of England Kaponga

2579

Walter Henry Franks, Father

21 May 1918

Rev Herbert A. Walke, Anglican

No	5
Date of Notice	21 May 1918
	Groom	Bride
Names of Parties	Jacob Kandrup Moller	Mary Franks
BDM Match (98%)	Jacob Randrup Moller	Mary Franks
	💍 1918/2986
Condition	Bachelor	Spinster
Profession	Factory Manager	Domestic Duties
Age	26	20
Dwelling Place	Riverlea	Riverlea
Length of Residence	16 years	9 years
Marriage Place	St Marks Church of England Kaponga
Folio	2579
Consent	Walter Henry Franks, Father
Date of Certificate	21 May 1918
Officiating Minister	Rev Herbert A. Walke, Anglican

3 June 1918

Charles Arnold Cooper
Thora Henrietta Moller

Charles Arnold Cooper
Thora Henrietta Moller
💍 1918/2987

Bachelor
Spinster

Motor Mechanic
Domestic Duties

26
24

Kaponga
Kaponga

16 years
16 years

St Marks Church of England Kaponga

2580

3 June 1918

Rev Herbert A. Walke, Anglican

No	6
Date of Notice	3 June 1918
	Groom	Bride
Names of Parties	Charles Arnold Cooper	Thora Henrietta Moller
	💍 1918/2987
Condition	Bachelor	Spinster
Profession	Motor Mechanic	Domestic Duties
Age	26	24
Dwelling Place	Kaponga	Kaponga
Length of Residence	16 years	16 years
Marriage Place	St Marks Church of England Kaponga
Folio	2580
Consent
Date of Certificate	3 June 1918
Officiating Minister	Rev Herbert A. Walke, Anglican

8 June 1918

Clarence Woodhouse Bevins
Ada Evelyn Macdonald

Clarence Woodhouse Bevins
Ada Evelyn Maindonald
💍 1918/2988

Bachelor
Spinster

Farmer
Domestic duties

25
19

Kaponga
Kaponga

8 months
6 years

St Johns Methodist Church Kaponga

2581

Thomas Macdonald, Father

8 June 1918

Rev Charles Blair, Methodist

No	7
Date of Notice	8 June 1918
	Groom	Bride
Names of Parties	Clarence Woodhouse Bevins	Ada Evelyn Macdonald
BDM Match (95%)	Clarence Woodhouse Bevins	Ada Evelyn Maindonald
	💍 1918/2988
Condition	Bachelor	Spinster
Profession	Farmer	Domestic duties
Age	25	19
Dwelling Place	Kaponga	Kaponga
Length of Residence	8 months	6 years
Marriage Place	St Johns Methodist Church Kaponga
Folio	2581
Consent	Thomas Macdonald, Father
Date of Certificate	8 June 1918
Officiating Minister	Rev Charles Blair, Methodist

10 June 1918

George Alfred Stephen Melville
Helena Elizabeth Dalgarno

George Alfred Stephen Melville
Helena Elizabeth Dalgarno
💍 1918/2989

Bachelor
Spinster

Clerk

25
30

Timaru
Timaru

4 years (3 days)
11 years (3 days)

Church of England Kaponga

2582

10 June 1918

Rev Herbert A. Walke, Anglican

No	8
Date of Notice	10 June 1918
	Groom	Bride
Names of Parties	George Alfred Stephen Melville	Helena Elizabeth Dalgarno
	💍 1918/2989
Condition	Bachelor	Spinster
Profession	Clerk
Age	25	30
Dwelling Place	Timaru	Timaru
Length of Residence	4 years (3 days)	11 years (3 days)
Marriage Place	Church of England Kaponga
Folio	2582
Consent
Date of Certificate	10 June 1918
Officiating Minister	Rev Herbert A. Walke, Anglican

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 1908. 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).