When the bank above the river caves in, Bayard sees "a dead horse" in the water, with "a man in a black uniform" hanging "over his rump by one stirrup" (51). The uniform, Bayard realizes, is really blue, "only it was wet" (51).
This icon represents the Confederate unit that Drusilla refers to as her "Uncle John's" "troop" when she asks Bayard to ask John Sartoris to let her ride with them (47). From other texts readers know that this unit was an irregular one, formed by Sartoris after he left the Army of Northern Virginia to return to Mississippi, where he could fight the Yankees closer to home.
Among the huge group of self-emancipated slaves crowding toward the river and the Union army is "one old woman" who tries to get a ride on Rosa Millard's wagon so that she can "see the water before she died" (48).
