This "gaunt and tattered, battle-grimed and fleeing and undefeated" lieutenant is leading the Confederate cavalrymen fighting a rear-guard action against the Union troops attacking Jefferson when Cecilia Farmer first sees him (182); after the war they marry, and he takes her to live on the "small hill farm" he inherits from his father in Alabama (185). The description of the farm is the basis for identifying him as 'Lower' class, despite the fact that he is an officer.
The carpetbagger named Redmond associates himself with this General, "the brigadier commanding the force which occupied Jefferson" (183). (Historically, the Union forces who burned - but did not occupy - Oxford in 1863 were under the command of General Andrew Jackson Smith, who is mentioned as "General Smith" in other Yoknapatawpha fictions.)
The historical Nathan Bedford Forrest was a slave-trader before the Civil War who became one of the Confederacy's most effective military leaders. In the novel he is simply mentioned as the officer whom Sartoris and his irregular troop "joined" with in Tennessee (181).
After Sartoris is deposed from the Confederate regiment he organized at the start of the war, he organizes this troop - "a small gang of irregular cavalry" - to fight with Forrest in Tennessee (181).
This is the "body" of troops who fight Union troops at the Sartoris plantation and retreat through Jefferson, where "a rear-guard action of cavalry" enables the unit to withdraw still further southward (182).
As part of its description of Jefferson's "Female Academy," the narrative mentions "a young female from Long Island or Philadelphia" who receives an invitation "signed by Queen Victoria" (177).
The status of Jefferson's "Female Academy" is established by the value that a "certificate" from it has for "a young woman of North Mississippi or West Tennessee" (177).
