He was a German immigrant from a liberal tradition who fled Europe after the 1848 revolutions. Fortunate I think because Robinson captures the real Carl Schurz who was something of a crusader in his day. Robinson came into Cheyenne Autumn after Spencer Tracy bowed out due to ill health. There are other people of conscience here in this film, Sergeant Mike Mazurki, Army Doctor Sean McClory and real life Secretary of the Interior Carl Schurz played by Edward G. Of course his association with Baker helps him see the light. Widmark too is a man of conscience and in the course of the film makes a potentially career ending decision in dealing with the Cheyenne. She's a great Christian lady who obeys her conscience and walks the walk in her religious beliefs. She was a school teacher on the reservation and the kids need some looking after. She elects to go, considers it her Christian duty to be with them. Baker's not there because of being forced. It seems as though Quaker school teacher Carroll Baker is with the fleeing Cheyenne. The army goes after them and Captain Richard Widmark takes command after Major George O'Brien is killed. They were led by their three chiefs played by Victor Jory, Ricardo Montalban, and Gilbert Roland. In 1878 a band of Cheyenne, tired of the conditions on the reservation in Indian territory that they were enduring, broke the reservation and started north to their native homelands in what would be Wyoming. The action of the film is about 45% with the soldiers, 45% with the Cheyenne, and that 10% being that famous comic interlude in Dodge City. But Cheyenne Autumn is the one where the Indians are given equal time with the white soldiers. Fort Apache was a film in which Ford showed the Indian as the wronged party. Contrary to some belief, Cheyenne Autumn is not the film vehicle John Ford used to make it up to the American Indian.
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