Josey Wales was the most wanted man in Texas. His wife and child had been lost to pre-civil War destruction and, like Jesse James and other young farmers, he joined the guerrilla soldiers of Missouri—men with no cause but survival and no purpose but revenge.

Josey Wales and his Cherokee friend, Lone Watie, set out for the West through the dangerous Camanchero territory. Hiding by day, traveling by night, they are joined by an Indian woman named Little Moonlight, and rescue an old woman and her granddaughter from their besieged wagon. The five of them travel toward Texas and win through brash and honest violence, a chance for a new way of life.