The series' final episode begins and ends with the two characters who stayed with it from beginning to end, as Charlie tells Hawks about his earlier days working for trading post operator Jarbo Pierce. Jarbo, once a wild, hard-drinking man, had become a minister, though he could still take on any man who tried to fight him. When his younger brother Adam arrived at the post Jarbo found himself at odds with him as Adam preferred the wilder ways of life and didn't understand Jarbo's concerns for the Indians he traded with, and began working with a man who wanted to use ...
A white renegade rides into the wagon train camp with an Indian girl tied to a rope and forced to walk without food or water. He says that he is bringing her back to the tribe where she will be tortured and killed for killing the chief's son. Hawks, in charge of a smaller group until Hale and Coop meet them with the rest of the train, decides to forcibly take the girl from her sadistic captor and keep her with his group, even knowing that this may lead to an attack from the chief's tribe.
Tough and headstrong female ferryboat captain Samantha Stewart is asked by her son Johnny and his bride to accompany them on the wagon train to California, where they will board a ship for a Pacific voyage. But actually, Johnny is not telling his proud mother that her doctor has told him that she must stay with a dry climate on land or she will die.
The wagon train comes across old Jamison Hershey and Herman, his 3000 pound Belgian horse. The old man has made it safely through hostile Indian territory because the tribes are so in awe of his horse. Hershey and Herman are invited to ride with the train, though it becomes apparent that Herman is not able to travel very fast and may hold back the entire group.
With Hawks ill and Comanches threatening to attack, an Army troop meets up with the wagon train. The Indians appear to greatly outnumber the soldiers, so to give the train hope the troop's lieutenant falsely tells Hale and Coop that there is also a relief column headed their way. Complicating matters even more, a sergeant from the troop recognizes Clay Shelby, a young man on the wagon train traveling with his pregnant wife, as a deserter from back in the Civil War whom he blames for the death of his brother.
A blind man called Sangre has joined the wagon train along with his guide. He is actually Coop's boyhood blood brother Richard Bloodgood, and he openly states his plan to kill Coop. Coop gets very hostile and refuses to discuss it whenever Charlie or Barnaby ask the reason Richard wants to kill him, but they know it has to do with the death of a beautiful woman long ago.
Brian Conlin walks into Hale's camp, delirious and dehydrated. After he recovers, he leads Coop to his group of Irish immigrants, whose wagons have broken down, and Hale invites them to join the wagon train. However, having been repeatedly turned away from place after place, most members of Conlin's group are slow to trust anyone or accept help.
Cooper Smith is on his way to the town of Washburn to pick up long awaited mail for the wagon train when he stumbles upon a stagecoach robbery in progress. The very proper Miss Barbara Lindquist is on her way to meet her fiancé, mistakes Coop for one of the robbers and ends up forcing him to help her. Further misadventures see Coop wounded and both he and Barbara struggling to get to back to the wagon train for help. Believing his wound will end his days as a scout, Coop finds himself falling in love with Barbara and she with him. But will their love stand the test ...
Bill accompanies Barnaby to Sam Race's tent city of "entertainers", where a girl from the train that Barnaby likes has taken a job, not as a singer, as she had thought, but as a saloon girl. Bill hopes to keep Barnaby out of trouble with the gambling and con games Race runs, but trouble and humiliation is just what they both find.
Hide hunters, hunters who kill buffalo for their hides only, have temporarily joined up with the wagon train. One of their number, Gib Ryker, is a sociopath who enjoys antagonizing young Barnaby West. With the train desperately needing fresh meat, Cooper Smith, along with Barnaby, sets off with the hide hunters to look for buffalo. Along the way Gib continues to bait Barnaby, much to Coop's dismay until Barnaby is forced to defend himself, with disastrous results. Now Barnaby has to face Gib's brother Zach, who's out for revenge.
Ex-Marshal Bob Stuart and his new wife are among three wagons joining Chris Hale's wagon train. Scout Cooper Smith is assigned to escort the new wagons to join up with the main train but there is blood, bad blood, between the scout and the ex-lawman. Entering the mix are old friends from Cooper Smith's past who also have an ax to grind against Bob Stuart. Coop soon becomes caught in between the man he was and the man he's become as his friends set out to destroy Bob Stuart and anyone who gets in the way.