Academy Award winner Gary Cooper stars as an ex-Confederate officer seeking retribution against the men who murdered his family in Dallas. Blayde Hollister (Cooper) rides into town to find the men who killed his family and stole his land while he was fighting in the Civil War. To evade Union authorities who consider him an outlaw, Hollister takes the identity of U.S. Marshal Martin Weatherby (Leif Erickson) and, one by one, exacts revenge from the murderers. But the last and wiliest of the killers, Will Marlow (Raymond Massey), discovers the ruse and forces a final showdown.