Hillsborough (NC) Recorder
June 19, 1861
Page 2
Brilliant
Victory—Battle at Bethel
Church
Soon after our
paper went to press last week, a report reached here that an engagement had
taken place between a portion of our troops and a party of Federal troops
numbering four or five thousand, at Bethel Church, near Yorktown,
Virginia. The report as it first reached
us made the numbers of killed on either side so disproportionate, and our force
so small compared with theirs, that we were in some doubt as to the accuracy of
the account; yet subsequent statements have well sustained the facts, and we
have to thank a superintending Providence for a most brilliant victory. It appears from the accounts which have
reached us that the loss of the enemy may have been not much short of three
hundred killed, and we know not how many wounded; while our loss was but one killed, Private Henry W. Wyatt, of
the Edgecomb Guards, and seven wounded.
The
force on our side was composed of the first North Carolina Regiment, consisting
of 800 men, the Orange Light Infantry under the command of Capt. Ashe, being a
portion, and 360 Virginians, opposed to some 4,500 of the Federal troops.
The
following is a list of the companies composing the North Carolina regiment which has so well
distinguished itself on this occasion:
- 1st Company, Edgecomb
Guards, Capt.
Bridgers
- 2d Company, Hornet’s
Nest Rifles, Capt.
Williams
- 3d Company, Charlotte
Grays, Capt.
Ross
- 4th Company, Orange Light
Artillery, Capt. Ashe
- 5th Company, Bencombe Riflemen, Capt. McDowell
- 6th Company, Lafayette
L. Infantry, Capt.
Starr
- 7th Company, Burke Rifles, Capt.
Avery
- 8th Company, Fayetteville
Indep’nt Capt.
Huske
- 9th Company, Enfield
Blues, Capt.
Bell
K. 10th
Company, Southern Stars, Capt. Hoke
One company from Edgecomb,
two from Charlotte, one from Chapel Hill, one from Bencombe,
two from Fayetteville, one from Burke, one from Enfield, and one from Lincoln
county.
