Late in the Civil War, three Confederate soldiers escape from Camp Benton, a Union prison camp in Missouri. They soon fall into the hands of pro-Confederate raiders, who force them to to go to Santa Fe to join a civilian wagon train that will be secretly transporting $1miilion in Union gold to St. Louis, Missouri. The three men are to lead the wagons into a raider trap at Cow Creek in Missouri, but one of them builds friendships with the wagon train travelers and a widow and he continues to have doubts and misgivings..