The Digital Yoknapatawpha Project

Only briefly mentioned by name, Bridger is one the men in Grumby's gang; he assists Matt Bowden in surrendering Grumby to Bayard and Ringo.

What Bayard first sees as a "thing hanging over the middle of the road from a limb" is quickly and chillingly recognized as the body of "an old Negro man, with a rim of white hair and with his bare toes pointing down and his head on one side like he was thinking about something quiet" (177). Grumby has apparently lynched him to serve as a graphic warning to the boys: pinned to his corpse is a badly written note telling them to "Turn back" (177).

An accomplice of Grumby whose name is not mentioned until after he himself has departed for Texas, Bowden is described with unusual detail. His clothes - "neat little fine made boots," "linen shirt," and "coat that had been good once, too" (166) - and even his "little" hands (168) and "little fine made boots" (166) suggest an upper class background. When he first appears he is posing as a planter from Tennessee chasing Grumby himself. His actions in the story, however, show him to be at least as ruthless and vicious as Grumby.

In "Vendee" and then again in The Unvanquished this boy, along with his mother, is a victim of Grumby. Described by Bayard as "almost as big as Ringo and me," the boy is "unconscious in the stable with even his shirt cut to pieces" after he was brutally whipped by Grumby and his men (164).

Presumably the woman who answers the door at his house is Ab Snopes's wife. (He has two. Flem's mother is Lennie, but given the Civil War setting of this event it's more likely that this is Ab's first wife, Vynie.) She tries to throw Bayard, Ringo, and Uncle Buck off the track by telling them that "Mr. Snopes" has gone to Alabama (162).

This man is described by Bayard as one of the "Compson niggers holding an umbrella" over the big preacher from Memphis at Rosa Millard's funeral (156). (In the earlier version of "Vendee" as a short story, Bayard had described him as "a town nigger" instead.)

"Refugeeing" was a Civil War term for white Southerners who fled from areas of fighting into regions that were presumed to be safer. Bayard says that this minister is "from Memphis or somewhere," and describes him as a " big refugeeing preacher with his book already open and one of the Compson niggers holding an umbrella over him" (156). Mrs. Compson and other Jefferson townspeople have asked him to officiate at Granny's funeral, presumably because of her status as both an Episcopalian and a member of the local aristocracy.

Bayard distinguishes the "Jefferson people" who attend Granny's funeral from the people there who "come in from the hills" (156). There is an implicit difference in class. The country people walk or ride mules. The townspeople have carriages, and many of them have slaves with them, to hold their umbrellas over them.

Consisting of both blacks and whites, this group comes to Granny's funeral to pay their respects to her and to express their gratitude for the care she took of them during the War. The blacks have returned to Yoknapatawpha after following the Union Army to seek freedom (155). The whites are "hill people" as opposed to townspeople; the "hill men with crockersacks tied over their heads" to shelter them from the rain are contrasted with the "town men with umbrellas" (98).

Presumably too "old" to serve in the Confederate army, this group of "old men" once captured Grumby, but released him after he showed them what he claimed was a commission from General Forrest (150).