Colonel Thomas and his men do quite well, rounding up some 3,000 wild horses. The problem is, the U.S. government agents rub them the wrong way and try to cheat them out of $10.00 a head. Luckily for Thomas, representatives of the Emperor Maximilian are on hand and offer to buy the whole herd, sight unseen, at a better price if Thomas and his men will drive them to Mexico. They too have to evade Union troops who try to stop them from taking the horses across the border. By this time, the Confederates are in Mexico as well and have proudly donned their gray uniforms and fly their rebel flag. A young lieutenant named Bubba Wilkes (Jan-Michael Vincent) is also hopelessly in love with the Colonel's daughter Charlotte (Melissa Newman), but she complains that she is too young to marry and that all he wants to do is hold, hug and kiss her. The very idea! This is a western though, and soon Colonel Thomas spots his old enemies and becomes aware that they are being stalked by Mexican bandits. He and his adopted Indian son, Blue Boy (L.A. Rams quarterback Roman Gabriel), ride in to warn the southerners.
Colonel Langdon explains that he and his people are waiting for an escort from Emperor Maximilian and thanks Thomas for the heads-up about the bandits -they also learn that they are enemies and that Thomas commanded the cavalry which killed Langdon's brother at Shiloh, but that's okay because Langdon's sister-in-law Anne obviously falls instantly in love with John Wayne (the single, blue-eyed blonde is smitten with the star of the movie -I know you never saw that one coming!) and to add extra tension the Colonel's daughter Charlotte and big-chief football star fall in love at first sight, well in his case it was more like a creepy leer but you get the idea. Oddly enough this same Charlotte mentioned above takes one look at this much older, uneducated, poor and rather wooden Indian who may well have killed her uncle and though they do not know each other or ever speak more than a few words in the whole movie wants to do nothing but hold, hug and kiss him and get married as soon as possible. Sure she mocked the other guy for wanting to do exactly that, but he was a white, southern, lieutenant named Bubba; how can that compare to an enlisted bugler from the enemy army that destroyed her family named Blue Boy, after all he's an Indian! Women, go figure. . . . . . .
Anyway, the Confederates are attacked by the Mexican bandits but in the thick of the fight Thomas' men show up and help turn the tide in the film's first major shoot-up. Later on, in thanks, the Rebs invite the Yanks to a Fourth of July party (which seems odd for enemies of the USA so soon after the war) during which the war rivalry resurfaces in a fist-swinging brawl started by an arrogant Yankee and a Confederate giant named Little George played by former footballer Merlin Olsen before he started selling loser actor bouqets. After they go their seperate ways, Colonel Thomas and his men come across a troop of French cavalry that have been massacred by the Juaristas and Blue Boy eagerly volunteers to go tell Langdon that their escort from the Emperor will not be coming, anxious for any chance to get his hands on his pale-face sweetie again. Thomas and his men meet up with the Emperor's agents who start counting the horses and waiting for their payroll to arrive.
Colonel Langdon and his Confederates ride on alone to Durango where they are welcomed in the name of Emperor Maximilian by General Lazaro Rojas who flies the Confederate battle ensign under the Mexican Imperial colors and has the mariachi band strike up a Hispanic version of "Dixie". However, at a welcome dinner General Rojas surrounds the southerners, replaces the flags with that of the Mexican republic of Benito Juarez and informs Langdon that he and his people are all prisoners of the revolution. He threatens the safety of the women and children and to show Langdon that he means business allows him to witness the execution by firing squad of a group of French prisoners of war. General Rojas then forces the Colonel to go to John Henry Thomas and bring back his herd of horses for the Juarista cause by the next day or else he will massacre all of the southerners. Big Chief Foot Ball sneaks into town to recue Pale Faced Virgin but figures the rest can fend for themselves.
Colonel Langdon reaches Thomas, and is understandably disgusted with having to ask the Yankees for help, but since General Rojas has been such a gentleman up to this time they figure he will keep his word and decide to take the horses to him and to blazes with their contract with Emperor Maximilian. Naturally, the Emperor's agents are not thrilled with the idea of Thomas taking their herd of horses to their enemies and the troop of French cavalry sent to escort the payroll attack Colonel Thomas and his men. This is the second big dust-up of the film and I shouldn't have to tell you who wins. It's John Wayne and a bunch of American cowboys fighting Frenchmen, besides which the Americans have pistols and rifles while the French only seem to have swords to fight with. Ultimately of course, the French are sent running and Thomas and Langdon arrive with the horses just as General Rojas is about to execute his first batch of southerners. The prisoners are immediately released and Thomas and Langdon join with General Rojas, the man who tricked them, held them hostage, threatened to massacre them and extorted 3,000 horses from them--- and they all have a drink and toast Benito Juarez and the Mexican revolution. Go figure.
As the whole group teams up to ride back home, the Yankees now broke and the Rebs unemployed, the Confederates accept that the war is over and replace their uniforms with civilian clothes. Thomas plans to go to the Oklahoma Territory, where he will probably have Anne Langdon joining him, little Miss Charlotte is already trying to change Blue Boy having made him get something close to a haircut and Colonel Langdon decides that he'll become a congressman when he gets home. The film ends with harmonica music. When "Dixie" is played the Yanks protest, when "Battle Hymn of the Republic" is tried the Rebs won't have it either, but when the musician strikes up "Yankee Doodle" all sides join in, proving that despite what differences Americans have with each other, everyone can agree on the shared hatred of Great Britain. This is not a very deep movie, the plot is fairly feeble, but it is a fun, simple, little western which touches on some good things and is likely the only movie to feature John Wayne fighting with the gayest man in Hollywood of his time.