
After their parents are killed by Union soldiers, Jesse James and his brother Frank, along with the rest of their gang, ride into Kansas looking for William Quantrill. Seeking revenge against the Union, Jesse wants to join Quantrill's Raiders, who are plotting to claim Kansas for the Confederacy. The more time Jesse spends with Quantrill, however, the more he realizes that Quantrill isn't a hero fighting for the South, but a murderous madman.
After their parents are killed by Union soldiers, Jesse James and his brother Frank, along with the rest of their gang, ride into Kansas looking for William Quantrill. Seeking revenge against the Union, Jesse wants to join Quantrill's Raiders, who are plotting to claim Kansas for the Confederacy. The more time Jesse spends with Quantrill, however, the more he realizes that Quantrill isn't a hero fighting for the South, but a murderous madman.
The last job of Calvary Captain Nathan Brittles (John Wayne) before retirement is to soothe relations with the Cheyenne and Arapaho Indians after Custer's last stand. At the same time, he must transport the wife (Mildred Natwick) and niece (Joanne Dru) of his commanding officer to a safe destination. After both his missions stall, Brittles attempts a face-to-face meeting with an important Native American chief in order to stave off an impending war.
After an outlaw named Tom Chaney murders her father, feisty 14-year-old farm girl Mattie Ross hires Rooster Cogburn, a boozy, trigger-happy lawman, to help her find Chaney and avenge her father. The bickering duo are not alone in their quest, for a Texas Ranger named LaBoeuf is also tracking Chaney for reasons of his own. Together the unlikely trio ventures into hostile territory to dispense some Old West justice.
A captured Rebel colonel (Joseph Cotten) and his men are posted at a Union commander's (Jeff Chandler) fort in Indian country.
The avenging head of the McCandle clan returns to his estranged family and leads the search for his kidnapped grandson. Big Jake sets off, his sons in tow, to deliver the ransom to the kidnappers, but has little intention of handing it over without a fight.
An ex-convict and his partner eye an armored stagecoach full of gold fitted with a Gatling gun for protection.
Questions arise when Senator Stoddard (James Stewart) attends the funeral of a local man named Tom Doniphon (John Wayne) in a small Western town. Flashing back, we learn Doniphon saved Stoddard, then a lawyer, when he was roughed up by a crew of outlaws terrorizing the town, led by Liberty Valance (Lee Marvin). As the territory's safety hung in the balance, Doniphon and Stoddard, two of the only people standing up to him, proved to be very important, but different, foes to Valance.
The Rev. Shay moves out West to set up his new home in Montana so that he can spread God's word. But when his wife, Raysha, leaves him for another man -- in part because she wants to return to Philadelphia -- the reverend decides to replace his spiritual ways with a gun. After shooting down his wife and her lover, he battles a landowner intent on keeping all the town's water for himself. But his deadly ways make him yearn for a belief in God again.
When gunslinger Joe Burdette (Claude Akins) kills a man in a saloon, Sheriff John T. Chance (John Wayne) arrests him with the aid of the town drunk, Dude (Dean Martin). Before long, Burdette's brother, Nathan (John Russell), comes around, indicating that he's prepared to bust his brother out of jail if necessary. Chance decides to make a stand until reinforcements arrive, enlisting Dude, an old cripple named Stumpy (Walter Brennan) and baby-faced cowboy Colorado Ryan (Ricky Nelson) to help.