Rolls of Co "K", 32nd Mississippi Regt list this man as 3rd Sergeant through the end of 1862, when men from the 26th Mississippi were ordered back to their parent unit. As mentioned, we don't know when he actually reported to the 26th Mississippi, but it may have been during the fall or winter of 1863. Since his rank in the 26th was private and he never held a commission, it makes sense that he went back to his old company as a private.

You mentioned home-manufacture, a term used to described Confederate-made revolvers. According to William A Albaugh III, total wartime production by Griswold & Gunnison, Leech & Rigdon, Spiller & Burr was less than 7,500. Other Confederate manfacturers produced an estimated 1,000 revolvers. In contrast, Confederate imports of the Kerr, a revolver manfauctured by the London Armory Company, totaled 9,000. Kerr revolvers alone outnumbered all Confederate-made revolvers. Besides the Kerr, thousands of other English and French-made revolvers made it through the blockade and into Confederate hands.
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That being said, high quality revolvers like the Kerr were always in great demand. The Confederacy didn't have nearly enough to arm all officers or even all cavalrymen. For example, many Confederates in mounted service carried only a single-shot longarm or carbine. When fighting on horseback, these were useful only as clubs.

Other than the same kind of longarms carried by other enlisted men, review of thousands of service files show no evidence that a Confederate NCO in an infantry command had a revolver. As you noted, this man was appointed sergeant in 1865. Certainly by that time, a sword or a revolver would be completely out of the ordinary for a sergeant in the 26th Mississippi.