The Digital Yoknapatawpha Project

The eldest of the four men - the others are Pose, Matthew, and Jim Blake - who load Lonnie Grinnup’s body onto a wagon for transfer to Tyler Ballenbaugh’s truck.

One of the founders of Yoknapatawpha County was a man named Grenier. Together with two others named Stevens and Holston, he came "on horseback, through the Cumberland Gap from the Carolinas," bought land from the Indians, established a family and "flourished" (70). In fact, before the Civil War he owned a plantation with a "thousand and more acres" of land (71), and in other Yoknapatawpha fictions is identified as Louis Grenier, the original "Old Frenchman" after whom Frenchman's Bend is named.

One of the founders of Yoknapatawpha County was a man named "Holston" (70). Together with two others named Stevens and Grenier, he came "on horseback, through the Cumberland Gap from the Carolinas," bought land from the Indians, established a family and "flourished" (70). In other Yoknapatawpha fictions he opens Jefferson's first hotel, the Holston House, which survives into the 20th century. This story, however, does not give any indication of how he prospered, and says that in time he "vanished" (70).

One of the founders of Yoknapatawpha County was a man named "Stevens" (70). Together with two others named Holston and Grenier, he came "on horseback, through the Cumberland Gap from the Carolinas," bought land from the Indians, established a family and "flourished" (70). Though the text gives no idea how he prospered, he is referred to as the only one of these founding fathers with a living descendant who bears his name.

The coroner who contacts Stevens about Lonnie Grinnup’s death and presides over the inquest is described as "an old country doctor" (70). He signs the death certificate without ever suspecting the death might not have been an accident.

Gavin Stevens, the county attorney, is the last representative of the pioneers who founded Yoknapatawpha County. Lonnie Grinnup had been the other living representative. Stevens goes "to look at the dead man’s face for a sentimental reason" (70). That sentiment initiates the Lonnie Grinnup murder case, because at the inquest for Lonnie Stevens smells something fishy. In his own way, which has clear connections to the traditions of literary detectives but also to the aristocratic idea of "noblesse oblige," Stevens proceeds to solve the mystery of Lonnie's death.

Joe is “a man not large, but with tremendous arms and shoulders; an adult, yet with something childlike about him” (68). Like Lonnie Grinnup, Joe has severe mental disabilities, being “deaf and dumb” (68). Joe, an “orphan” (70, 71), was “adopted” by Lonnie Grinnup, to whom he is fiercely loyal.

Lonnie Grinnup was christened Louis Grenier. He was the last descendant of one of the three white men who founded Yoknapatawpha County "a hundred years" earlier (70). He's "a man a little under medium size and somewhere in his middle thirties" (70). He has lived for decades in a shack on the river, "in almost the exact center" of the huge plantation once owned by the ancestor for whom he was named, though Lonnie himself was unaware of both that past and his own true name.

The younger of the two men who discover Lonnie's body is described as "a youth, less than twenty, by his face" (67). He tells Stevens that, after the discovery, he "won't never eat another" fish (74).

The older of the two men who discover Lonnie's body is described as "a man of about forty" (72); his dialect - "Him and Joe" (67), "Yonder's his boat" (69) - indicates that, like most of the story's characters, he's a "country-bred man" (78).