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officer sanctioned an even wider discrepancy and set down his age as 18 in May 1861.
Many things happened to the Baxter family during the next decade. A local newspaper reported Vermelle Anne as a member of a young women?s temperance and total abstinence group. Sarah Flagler Baxter died of yellow fever in 1853 at the age of 37. Emma Baxter also died during this period of an unrecorded ailment, although in all likelihood it was small pox, this disease being endemic in the Mississippi City region. Mary Elizabeth and 17-year-old Margaret Vermelle Anne took over the hc^sehold duties and made a valiant attempt to keep the family together.
On December 18, 1855, Mary Elizabeth Baxter was wed to David A. Yates, a New York builder from Moss Point. His younger brother, J. P. Yates, later served with the Baxter boys in Company E of the 20th Mississippi. On February 14, 1858, Margaret Vermelle Anne Baxter and Sidney Otis of Handsboro were wed. He was from New York and worked as a lumber sawyer. The next year Caroline Sarah Baxter was married to EnotfOtis, younger step-brother to Sidney and destined to serve also in Company E.
The 1860 census shows clearly the effect the death of Sarah Baxter had on the family. Nineteen-year-old John and 11-year-old Benjamin were living with their sister, Vermelle. Marion Francis was living with his sister, Mary Elizabeth, and her husband, David Yates; in the same household was J. P. Yates. Susan in all probability was living with her sister Caroline.
Marion Francis Baxter and J. P. Yates enlisted in Adams Rifles at Handsboro in /ftil 1861; John W. Baxter and Enos Otis enlisted in Company E (formerly Adams Rifles) of the 20th Mississipi Regiment at Mobile on August 31, 1863. A Col. Miller was the mustering officer.
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