FILM SUMMARY

The Searchers opens in Texas in 1868 with Ethan Edwards (John Wayne) riding up to the homestead his brother Aaron (Walter Coy) shares with wife Martha (Dorothy Jordan) and their three children. Although he is welcomed, some uneasiness is evident, stemming in part from questions about Ethan's activities since the Civil War's conclusion three years earlier, and in part from the clear attraction between Ethan and Martha. When the Edwards’ adoptive son Martin Pauley2 (Jeffrey Hunter) joins them for dinner, Ethan is openly hostile to the young man, seemingly due to his part-Cherokee heritage.

The next morning, Ethan and Martin join the Reverend Captain Samuel J. Clayton (Ward Bond) and a handful of other men in pursuit of cattle rustlers, realizing too late that this is a Comanche diversion for a murder raid. Ethan and Martin return to the Edwards’ homestead to find it in flames, with Aaron and his son Ben (Robert Lyden) dead, Martha both raped and killed, and the two girls Lucy (Pippa Scott) and Debbie (Lana Wood) kidnapped. After a hasty funeral, the men set out again in the hopes of rescuing the girls. When one of their group is wounded in a skirmish with the band of natives who have kidnapped the girls, Clayton and the others turn back, leaving Ethan, Martin, and Lucy's beau Brad Jorgensen (Harry Carey, Jr.) to search on alone.

Ethan later finds Lucy raped and murdered in a canyon and buries her, but keeps it from the younger men until Brad, having scouted ahead, reports with excitement that he has spotted Lucy in the Comanche camp. When Ethan confesses the truth, the distraught Brad charges off in a frenzy and is killed. Ethan and Martin search on, returning a year later to the Jorgensen homestead, where we learn that the pretty young Laurie (Vera Miles) has been impatiently awaiting Martin's return. The next morning, though Laurie tries to prevent him, Martin sets off after Ethan, who has ridden ahead.