It is a fictionalized account of an African-American man born on January 1st,1863, the day President Abraham Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation, who becomes a Buffalo Soldier in Yosemite National Park.

VOA: standard.2009.11.25

It probably is at least in part, but mainly it is probably intended to be fiction or fictionalized biography.

最少一部分是，可是结果大相径庭,大篇都是虚构或文学小说化了的自传。

耶鲁公开课 - 1945年后的美国小说课程节选