William Colton rides into a town one month after Appomatox. Inside, there is a young man, not much more than a boy, who is talking really tough. An old man fresh out of a prison camp is there as well. The old man, Ab Nichols, fought for the Confederacy, and is offended when the young drunk, Jody Merriman, desecrates the Confederate flag. That's when Colton gets involved. As he fights for this man's honor, he remembers back to the last day of the Civil War and another young man he came face-to-fa

Colton rides into a town where a man he met during the Civil War is now a minister. Reverend Booker was a Confederate captain who once saved Colton's life, carrying him to safety while they fought at Shiloh. The Reverend is married, and his wife is expecting a child within the next couple of weeks. His life seems perfect. But there is a reason Colton rode in to find him. A gunfighter is looking for the Reverend so he can avenge him for a lawful killing the Reverend committed two years before. Th

A dance-hall girl's aspirations for a better life end in disappointment.

A cattle baron threatens Amish homesteaders.

Drifting through Kansas, Colton signs on as farmhand to an embittered woman caring for her husband, a Union colonel struck mute and catatonic from PTSD.

A friend's seductive fiancee places Colton in a dangerous situation.

Colton discovers the widow of a friend killed in an Apache raid is Indian.

Colton teaches a pacifist widow the value of fighting back.

Colton becomes a deputy to a bungling sheriff.

Colton befriends black Union soldier Lemuel Stove (Brock Peters) who is returning home to see his father. Upon arriving, however, Stove learns his father was lynched the previous evening by the Avengers, a Klan-like hate group.

Colton takes under his protective wing a timid Latvian immigrant venturing west to open a shoemaker's shop.

When a doctor proves to be as full of whiskey as he is of self-pity, Colton must perform an emergency appendectomy on a young gunfighter.

Colton is conscripted into a sheriff's posse tracking a wily old mountain man who won't be taken without a fight.

Colton keeps his promise to a dead deserter.

A youth defends his jailed father's innocence.

Trekking across an unforgiving desert, Colton is unhappy to be joined by a hapless senorita and her precious "pequeno." (a fig tree) He's even more unhappy when a pair of desperadoes dog his trail.

A wounded Colton finds a safe harbor with a lonely prairie woman while on the lam from an outlaw gang determined to kill him for witnessing their stagecoach robbery and murder.

A shady preacher wants a gunman murdered.

Colton traveled to the abandoned town of Paradise after a bartender told him a man with a missing leg and two friends were on their way to kill Major Dichter. He ordered an attack on April 6, 1862 that killed or injured over 100 men. These three men believe he knew the attack was impossible, and were furthermore upset that he received medals and pensions because of it. They planned to hang him. Colton protested, stating they should hold a trial for this man. Colton will be the defense.

Colton shoots a cavalry lieutenant skulking around his camp at night.

In an abandoned salt mine, Colton engages a dying young guitar-playing gunfighter in a final conversation while lurking outside a ruthless crook plots to get his hands on the dying man's loot.

Colton follows instructions left by the late Johnny Sharp to have the four people closest to the deceased gunman meet at the undertaker's parlor.