Athlete, football and hockey player, Titanic victim. He was the son of James Baxter, a banker, and Helene de Lanaudiere Chaput (a descendant of the french-canadian aristocracy). He received his education in the prestigious Loyola Jesuit College, and enrolled in Applied Sciences at McGill University. However, sport was his true passion and he dropped out of school to pursue it. A member of the Montreal Amateur Athletic Association, he played football. In 1907, he played for one season with the Montreal Shamrocks Hockey Club. After an accident cost him the loss of sight in an eye, he turned to coaching. After a stint of coaching in Switzerland, he returned playing hockey in 1911. He played in an amateur hockey tournament in Chamonix, France, with Les Patineurs de Paris hockey club who won over the Oxford Canadians. After the tournament, he joined his mother and sister Helene (Mrs Frederick Charles Douglas) aka Zette Baxter for the trip back home. The family boarded the Titanic in Cherbourg, France. What he did not tell his mother, is that a 24-year old cabaret singer, Berthe Mayné, whom he had met in Brussels, would also be part of the trip. He had booked her on the ship under the assumed name of Mme De Villiers, with the intention of marrying her in Montreal. On the night of April 15, 1912, he inquired to know why the ship was stalled in mid-ocean. After he was informed by Captain Smith of the ship's accident, he returned to the cabin to get his mother, sister and lover into lifeboat # 6. It was in those tragic circumstances his mother discovered his love affair with « Mme De Villiers ». After boarding his mother in the lifeboat, he handed her his silver flask of brandy, and she jockingly complained about his alcohol habit. « Are you alright, Mother ? Goodbye and keep your spirits up, everyone. » were the last words she heard from him. His body was not recovered. His name is on the family monument, in Notre-Dame-des-Neiges Cemetery, Montreal.
Athlete, football and hockey player, Titanic victim. He was the son of James Baxter, a banker, and Helene de Lanaudiere Chaput (a descendant of the french-canadian aristocracy). He received his education in the prestigious Loyola Jesuit College, and enrolled in Applied Sciences at McGill University. However, sport was his true passion and he dropped out of school to pursue it. A member of the Montreal Amateur Athletic Association, he played football. In 1907, he played for one season with the Montreal Shamrocks Hockey Club. After an accident cost him the loss of sight in an eye, he turned to coaching. After a stint of coaching in Switzerland, he returned playing hockey in 1911. He played in an amateur hockey tournament in Chamonix, France, with Les Patineurs de Paris hockey club who won over the Oxford Canadians. After the tournament, he joined his mother and sister Helene (Mrs Frederick Charles Douglas) aka Zette Baxter for the trip back home. The family boarded the Titanic in Cherbourg, France. What he did not tell his mother, is that a 24-year old cabaret singer, Berthe Mayné, whom he had met in Brussels, would also be part of the trip. He had booked her on the ship under the assumed name of Mme De Villiers, with the intention of marrying her in Montreal. On the night of April 15, 1912, he inquired to know why the ship was stalled in mid-ocean. After he was informed by Captain Smith of the ship's accident, he returned to the cabin to get his mother, sister and lover into lifeboat # 6. It was in those tragic circumstances his mother discovered his love affair with « Mme De Villiers ». After boarding his mother in the lifeboat, he handed her his silver flask of brandy, and she jockingly complained about his alcohol habit. « Are you alright, Mother ? Goodbye and keep your spirits up, everyone. » were the last words she heard from him. His body was not recovered. His name is on the family monument, in Notre-Dame-des-Neiges Cemetery, Montreal.
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Bio by: Dominique Ritchot