The Plainsman

Wild Bill Hickok attempts to stop an Indian uprising that was started by white gun-runners.

• Director: Cecil B. DeMille
• Genre:Biography / War / Western
• Runtime:113 minutes

Cast

Gary Cooper : Wild Bill Hickok
Jean Arthur : Calamity Jane
James Ellison : William “Buffalo Bill” Cody
Charles Bickford: John Lattimer
Helen Burgess : Louisa Cody

With the end of the American Civil War, military industrialists are left with an oversupply of weapons. Some of the more unscrupulous ones view the Indians as possible new customers.

Having been just discharged from the Union Army, Wild Bill Hickok is making his way back west. On a paddle steamer, he bumps into his old army scout colleague, Buffalo Bill Cody and his new bride. Later, Calamity Jane is the driver of their stagecoach to Hays, Kansas.

Lattimer, an agent for the gun makers, has supplied the Cheyenne Indians with repeating rifles, which enables them to kill half of the troopers at an U.S. Cavalry outpost. Hickok finds out about rifles and reports it to General Custer. Custer sends out a resupply mule train to the fort with Cody as guide. Hickok tries to locate Yellow Hand, the Cheyenne chieftain, to find out why the Indians have gone to war.

When Calamity Jane is captured by the Indians, Hickok tries to bargain for her release but instead gets captured himself. In the only scene sympathetic to the Indian’s plight, Yellow Hand states that the Indians are fighting because the white man has starting settling land promised to the Indian and is killing off the buffalo. Yellow Hand promises to release his captives if they tell him the location of the resupply train. After much prodding from Jane, Hickok professes his love for her just before he is about to be tortured. Calamity Jane then discloses the route of the resupply train in order to save Hickok from being burned alive. Yellow Hand holds true to his word by releasing his two prisoners.

The Indians attack the resupply train. Hickok sends Jane to get reinforcements while he fights alongside the besieged soldiers. After a desperate six-day siege on a river bank, the survivors are saved when Custer arrives with the cavalry.

Back in town, Hickok catches up with Lattimer and tells him to get ready for a gun duel. Instead of going himself, Lattimer sends three cavalry deserters in his place. Hickok kills all three deserters in the gunfight, but this makes him a fugitive from the law. Hickok flees to the Dakota Territory. Calamity Jane leaves for Deadwood separately when the townspeople find out that she was partly responsible for the attack on the supply train. Read more