I could not wrap my mind around the concept that the Barkley family actually uses convict labor. Possibly because that other enterprising widow Scarlett O'Hara Hamilton Kennedy used it so effectively and ruthlessly in her single minded drive to lift herself from post Civil War poverty. Or maybe because cowboys resent being peach pickers.
In any event one of the Barkley income producers is a peach orchard and with the hands away on a roundup Barbara Stanwyck orders some convicts from the local prison. So they send three of their best two of them being real dregs on society, Andreas Teuber and Lonny Chapman. Teuber is a rapist and the sight of Linda Evans gets his mojo going. The guard with them is also a real winner. Albert Salmi is also a racist as well as a sadist.
Which brings me to the third convict, former slave and cavalryman Yaphett Kotto who has a nice way with horses. It's he who convinces Barbara Stanwyck, Linda Evans, and Richard Long who is head of a prison reform committee that maybe California should try out that new fangled concept of parole.
Kotto and Salmi turn in a pair of fine performances. But I could not buy the fact the Barkleys would use convict labor.