Plot

When Bob Patterson arrives to buy cattle he gets caught up in Kenney's plan to take over Halliday's ranch. Kenney's gang led by Slade are keeping all cattle buyers away so Halliday will be unable to pay off his note. When Slade robs Halliday, Bob has a plan that will use the stolen bills to trap Kenney.—Maurice VanAuken <mvanauken@a1access.net>

Bob Patterson and his sidekick, Sandy, take $5,000 to the Halliday ranch in Hidden Valley to purchase a herd of cattle. En route, Bob and Sandy capture a gang of men who attacked the stagecoach and take them to the sheriff. Jeff Halliday, whose daughter Elsie was on the stage, explains to Bob that previous potential cattle buyers all mysteriously disappeared, leaving him broke. Lafe Kinney and his associate, Ed Slade, who are behind Halliday's problems, plot to acquire the ranch because the land is due to be purchased for a new railroad line. The next morning, as Bob rounds up the cattle he purchased, Slade and his men demand that Halliday hand over the $5,000 that Bob paid him. Halliday refuses and is tortured. After Bob captures a gang of men attempting to rustle his cattle, Elsie arrives with news of her father's predicament. Bob returns to the ranch, where he learns that Halliday gave Slade the money. Then Hammond, a railroad representative, offers to purchase Halliday's property. Feigning defeat, Bob and Halliday offer to sell the ranch to Kinney. Then, when Kinney pays them off with the money Slade took from Halliday, Bob and Hammond summon the sheriff. The next night, during a dance, Slade and his men break into the jail, release Kinney and remove all evidence against them. Slade then abducts Elsie, and when Kinney objects, Slade kills him. A posse is formed and Slade demands that Bob meet him unarmed if Elsie is to be saved. Slade's gang is distracted by the ensuing fight and fail to notice the posse surrounding them. A shoot-out ensues and Bob kills Slade. While the victorious posse rides away, Elsie and Bob go off together.—Anonymous

One of the five Charles Starrett westerns in which Columbia second-billed band singer Donald Grayson (who they billed as "The Singing Sensation") behind Starrett in an effort to create their own singing cowboy star. Evidently thinking one western band was the same as any other, Columbia had Grayson as the lead singer in front of The Sons of the Pioneers,and had Bob Nolan strumming a bass in the background while singing not a note, and consequently lost the unique sound that made hits out of "Tumbling Tumbleweeds", "Cool Water", "Happy Rovin' Cowboy" and their other songs of the era. This is the best of that failed exercise musically as Ray Whitley was also along on a one-picture deal, thereby giving the band an extra guitar player and singer who, unlike Grayson, fit in like a tight glove because he knew what he was doing. The only "true" Sons of the Pioneers sound heard in the five Grayson pictures comes behind the opening credits when the original and real members (Bob Nolan, Len Slye (Roy Rogers), Tim Spencer, Hugh and Karl Farr) are performing "Tumbling Tumbleweeds." without, thankfully, the unneeded help of Grayson. Plot has rancher Bob Patterson (Charles Starrett), his foreman Sandy Grayson (Donald Grayson) and his cowhands Bob Nolan, Tim Spencer, Len Slye (the film name of Roy Rogers did not exist when this film was made), Hugh Farr and Karl Farr meeting and riding along with Halliday foreman Jim (Ray Whitley) on the way to buy cattle from rancher Jeff Halliday (Edward LeSaint), and all hands, including Starrett for one of the few times in his career, combining to sing "Riding Home." They are soon involved in a plot by businessman Lafe Kinney (Guy Usher) to force Halliday to sell his land cheaply, aided and abetted by his chief henchman Ed Slade (Dick Curtis). Slade, already greatly miffed because Patterson killed his outlaw brother in a foiled stagecoach holdup, robs Halliday of the $5,000 paid him by Patterson for cattle, but Halliday's daughter, Elsie (Barbara Weeks) informs Patterson and Sandy, who set out to trap the culprits through the use of marked bills. This is no easy task as the Kinney/Slade outfit employs no less than 25 henchmen which, while not a record for a B-western, did provide work for more than the usual in a series oater.They had so many that regular villains such as Tom London, Edmund Cobb, Jack Evans and other henchie regulars had other roles.—Les Adams <longhorn1939@suddenlink.net>