Charlie Deegan has gone from an Army sharpshooter to a drunken brawler to a prisoner in Yuma Territorial Prison. He escapes and heads north to change his ways and become a cowboy. On the way he fights Indians and Mexican banditos, tangles with a crooked sheriff and is locked in a military stockade when he is recognized as a prison escapee. He breaks out and vows never to drink again. He befriends a cowboy who offers him a job on a cattle drive. But can the hard drinking, brawling Charlie really become a cowboy?