About Loreta Velazquez:
According to The Woman in Battle, a book published by Loreta Velazquez in 1876 and the main source for her story, her father was the owner of plantations in Mexico and Cuba and a Spanish government official, and her mother's parents were a French naval officer and the daughter of a wealthy American family.

Loreta Velazquez claimed four marriages (though never took any of her husbands' names). Her second husband enlisted in the Confederate army at her urging, and, when he left for duty, she raised a regiment for him to command. He died in an accident, and the widow then enlisted -- in disguise -- and served at Manassas/Bull Run, Ball's Bluff, Fort Donelson and Shiloh under the name Lieutenant Harry T. Buford.
Loreta Velazquez also claims to have served as a spy, often dressed as a woman, working as a double agent for the Confederacy in the service of the U.S. Secret Service.
A newspaper report mentions a Lieutenant Bensford arrested when it was disclosed "he" was actually a woman, and gives her name as Alice Williams, which is a name which Loreta Velazquez apparently also used.
Interesting character! Should be an interesting read.

Loreta Vazquez Bibliography:
Hall, Richard. Patriots in Disguise: Women Warriors of the Civil War. 1994.
Leonard, Elizabeth D. All the Daring of the Soldier: Women of the Civil War Armies

I found some additional info on a site at the University of North Carolina.