After I was whacked and kicked in the head in a NOTL ditch, one of the first people I heard from was Donald Combe.

“We are all appalled and saddened by the event that severely disturbed and injured you yesterday,” he emailed me.

The next day in June, I saw an ambulance in front of the 94-year-old’s quaint little home and sent him a note hoping all was well.

“I am having some kidney stone problems,” he replied. “It is a kind of ‘wait with pain’ time. I too was highly impressed with the care and attention from the health system.”

His pain was treated, but too soon thereafter, his life ended. Donald died last week. He was 95.

I didn’t know him as others did. At first, it was seeing the old guy with a pair of perfect Scottie dogs trooping around Old Town. Later it was just one pooch, Maggie, walked by a slower man with a cane. Sometimes a cape.

Then came the cemetery.

Dorothy and I signed up for a tour of St Mark’s incredible graveyard one afternoon, and there was Donald, in a bow tie, providing colour commentary on the inhabitants. The stories were engaging. The storyteller just perfect.

Then, the flag.

At a Toronto art house auction appeared a massive but beaten-up red ensign with a funny crest sewn in the middle, attributed to “the parish at St Mark’s in Niagara.” Five hundred bucks. I bought it, and a few days later it was gracing the side of our 207-year-old pile of bricks in Old Town.

What was the story of this 10-foot-long piece of cloth? Were those really bullet holes? How old was this thing? Why did the church dump it?

Turns out Donald Combe, as church archivist, Sexton, historian, author and repository of all NOTL knowledge, was the guy to ask. So I did. He soon sent me a photo and description of that flag displayed in the church a century and a quarter ago, dating it to 1873.

“This is all we know about the flag,” he wrote. “There is no indication, that we can find any of its provenance. For years it was crammed into a cupboard under the stairs and many times there were threats to just put it into the trash; however, we kept it.

“Long before the entire archive went to the museum we thought to perhaps send the flag to auction as we could see no possible way of displaying or making use of it. It may well have been purchased for one of the special events mentioned, but who knows? I am just deeply relieved to know that it has a good new home. Maggie and I will walk by and gaze upon it.”

I met this man in the final years of his life. Thus, I didn’t know about all that had gone on before. Donald Combe cared for the oldest cemetery in the province. He wrote books — many of them — on Canadian history and genealogy. He studied at the Royal Academy for Dramatic Arts in England, taught speech and drama in Toronto, and was an actor who migrated half a century ago to Niagara.

In town he was a driver behind the Niagara Pumphouse Arts Centre and the historical society. He’s the reason all those mature trees behind the church are healthy and the historic stones below restored. He was named a Living Landmark by the NOTL Foundation 20 years ago, wrote local newspaper columns and was always proud of his United Empire Loyalist stock.

One day, Donald sent me a picture of Maggie. Just because he loved her. I hear she may be at his memorial service this Saturday.

Along the path behind St Mark’s, on a slight knoll near a trench dug during the 1812 war, Donald set his simple stone some years ago. Proudly etched with his year of birth was his title. “Sexton.” You cannot walk there without seeing it.

“I got an excellent spot,” he told me. “That will work out well.”

Garth Turner is a NOTL resident, journalist, author, wealth manager and former federal MP and minister. garth@garth.ca