U.Z. Rule

• Ulricus Zwinglius Rule

Clergyman. Born Gibraltar, son of the Rev. W.H. Rule. Educated London; Queen's College. Rule was the first Church of England missionary to work in the Bay of Islands and Bonne Bay.
The son of a Wesleyan minister posted in Malta, the West Indies and Gibraltar, Rule's later childhood was spent in England. In London he began attending services at the Church of England, eventually deciding to seek holy orders there. The Rev. William Grey qv, commissary to Newfoundland Bishop Edward Feild, persuaded him to come to Newfoundland. He arrived on Easter Sunday 1863 and enrolled in the Church of England Theological College (later Queen's College). Noting that he was already well educated, Feild stationed him with the Rev. George Hutchinson qv in the Labrador mission, at Battle Harbour. After a winter of hardship (lightened only by the sight of an iceberg in the likeness of Christ walking on the water) Rule was glad when Feild appointed him to Bay of Islands after his ordination in December 1864. He settled in Birchy Cove (Curling) in 1865, living in a series of makeshift parsonages while a church and dwelling were erected with help from local builders and English benefactors. The church at Birchy Cove was consecrated by Bishop Kelly in 1871. The next year Rule returned to England. In 1927 Dicks and Co. published his small book, Reminiscences of My Life, in which he recounted his experiences.