The Dalton Brothers - Bob, Grat, Bill, and Emmett - are part of the outlaw celebrity of the Wild West. Yet, their fame today largely stems from a caricatured distortion created by a certain lonely comic cowboy. The comic thus has some making up to do for the real Daltons. Their end is perhaps well-known: two of them died in a wild shootout while attempting to rob two banks simultaneously in Coffeyville, Kansas, and the third was shot two years later. Only Emmett, the youngest, survived. In a long flashback, a story unfolds of misfortune and misery, unfulfilled hopes, and wrong decisions - vividly told as a late Western ballad with a lasting impact. Almost a late redemption for the four desperados.