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[206] Walker's Texas infantry, Bee's cavalry finally mingled with the infantry, engaged the fresh troops of the Federal Thirteenth corps, 10,000 strong, and defeated them in an engagement which General Bee called ‘the battle of Peach Orchard, being a separate and distinct action from Mansfield.’ He acknowledged the gallant support of Colonel Randal, commanding brigade, and Col. Edward Clark, commanding regiment. ‘Captain Lane, of Debray's regiment, with his company, gallantly charged the enemy to draw their fire, preparatory to a combined charge by our infantry, with loss of Lieutenant Willis and a third of his company destroyed. Captain Borden, of Buchel's regiment, was severely wounded.’

It was Colonels Buchel and Hardeman who reconnoitered the Federal line before Pleasant Hill next day. In the afternoon Bee was ordered by General Green to charge with all the cavalry, and he says, ‘I at once moved with Debray's and Buchel's regiments that were formed in the road, ordering the other cavalry regiments to follow, and in column of fours moved rapidly across the space intervening between the two armies; but before the order was given to deploy and charge, the command was literally swept away by a cross-fire at close range from an enemy concealed behind a string of fence perpendicular to the enemy's line of battle. . . . What was left of Debray's gallant regiment succeeded in returning to our lines, with a loss of one-third their number. I had two horses shot under me. Colonel Debray was injured by the fall of his horse, which was killed. Colonel Buchel . . . drew back in time to avoid the fire of the ambuscade, passed to the left, dismounted his men, and drove the enemy from their ambuscade.’ Here the brave Buchel was mortally wounded, and two days later, said Bee, ‘the brave colonel died at my headquarters, a brilliant soldier of Prussia, and an irreparable loss to our cause and his adopted country.’ After the fall of General Green, General Bee assumed command of the cavalry corps until Gen. John A.

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