Major Clint Drango of the U.S. Army and his aide, Capt. Marc Banning, ride into a burned-out Georgia town shortly after the end of the Civil War with orders to set up a military governorship. The townspeople are bitter over the earlier destruction of their crops, homes, schools and church by Sherman and Union troops but they do not know that Drango was a participant in that destruction. Renegade former Confederates under Clay Allen plan to undermine Drango's benign administration in hopes of restarting the war. The renegades commit a series of crimes and killings and Drango's honesty and character eventually win him some converts in the town.