Since the latest update on the Switch edition, I have been getting game crahses frequently. Sometimes several times an hour, other times it’ll happen after several hours. Its random and I have not found any consistencies causing it.

Reopening the game usually starts it without an issue. Unfortunately, each crash causes a random mob that should not despawn will despawn. The first time my game crashed, my tamed horse wearing iron horse armor despawned. I turned cheats on and attenpted to locate it thinking it wandered off somehow despite being within a fence. Did not find. 

Next day game crashed. My new horse, with a name, despawned. Since I had cheats on, I attempted to teleport to it. The game said no entity with that name existed. I have since stopped taming horses.

in a different world, the game crashed and a cartographer villager despawned. My town only had three villagers, so I know he didnt just change jobs. 

The only consistent thing about this glitch is that it causes a mob to despawn that normally should not despawn.