"Rear Guard" relates loosely to Orozco’s 1926 series of drawings that consider the effects of war on the lives of ordinary people. Here the composition is filled by a large group of anonymous soldiers marching into the distance, their weariness suggested by the bent angles of their sombreros. At the back of the group are a young girl and three women wearing dresses, two of whom carry young children. (One woman reaches back to caress the infant’s foot, adding a human touch to this melancholy scene.) These figures refer to the large number of women and children who were displaced by the upheavals of the Mexican Revolution. The women may also be "soldaderas", camp followers who accompanied traveling soldiers and carried out a range of responsibilities. These women often were soldiers’ companions (and bore their children), procured and cooked food, and tended to the injured, and some occasionally smuggled ammunition or engaged in combat.