Tabor City mayor Baxter dies Tuesday

By BOB HIGH

Tabor City Mayor Marion Spencer Baxter – suffering from crippling arthritis for several weeks – took his own life Tuesday as he shot himself in the head with a pistol at 5 a.m. He died shortly after 11 p.m. when life support was withdrawn, according to local police.

The 73-year-old Baxter was lying in the bed he shared with his wife in their Whiteville home along West Lewis Street, and she was asleep until awakened by the sound of a .38-caliber pistol shot at 5 a.m.

Baxter and his wife, Ann Enzor Baxter, 64, had lived in Whiteville for the past several years. He had been elected mayor of Tabor City for a four-year term in 2003, although he spent his nights here where his wife is employed.

Reports show Baxter had been recently taken off medication for severe arthritis, because the medicine appeared to be causing some internal bleeding. Baxter’s health declined rapidly and he had been confined to bed at home for the past week.

His wife told police that Baxter kept a pistol in the nightstand beside their bed, and she didn’t know anything about what her husband – also mayor of Tabor City for nine years in 1980s – was doing early Tuesday until the gunshot awakened her.

Baxter was transferred from Columbus Regional Healthcare to New Hanover Regional Medical Center where he died.

Baxter was well known in Tabor City and was seen there nearly every day until his recent health problems. He resigned as mayor in 1990 after serving since 1981, and decided to seek the post again in 2003. Baxter, using a house-to-house campaign to garner support, edged incumbent mayor Nelson Lee by three votes.

Tabor City Town Manager Al Leonard said the town’s council will select a person to be mayor until the November 2007 election. Royce Harper is the town’s mayor pro-tem and is in charge of mayoral duties until Baxter’s successor is named.