Edward Sixtus Hutter was born in Bethlehem Pennsylvania September 6, 1812 to Christian Jacob Hutter and his second wife, Maria Charlotte Bauer. Edward was educated at Mt. Airy College in Germantown Pennsylvania and was then commissioned as midshipman in the U.S. Navy  in 1832. He became passed midshipman in 1838 and would resign his military commission in 1844 to focus his time and energy on his land in Virginia, Kentucky, and Missouri. Just four years before resigning from the Navy, Edward married Emma Williams Cobbs at Poplar Forest, Virginia 1840. Poplar Forest, the former summer home of President Thomas Jefferson, would become home to the Hutters where Edward would remain until his death on November 7, 1875.  

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Referred to by most of his family as Sixtus and sometimes just Six,there are many correspondences between Edward and his family that give insight to both his home at Poplar Forrest, but also to Sandusky the home of his half brother George Christian Hutter.