But one day, while Josey was out plowin' up a patch o' dirt to plant some vegetables, he saw smoke risin' up from the woods where his house should be. He ran home just in time to see his wife bein' carried out of their burnin' house by some Union Redlegs led by Captain John Terrill. He did his best to save his family, but he was on foot, unarmed, and outnumbered. He was struck down by Captain Terill hisself, and Wales bears the scar to this day.

When Wales came to, his family was dead and his house had been burnt to cinders. Now, this wouldn't set right with most folks, as you might expect. But something inside Josey Wales snapped that day. He fished out his .45 Peacemaker from the burnt ruins of his house and began to practice his shootin'. By the time Bloody Bill Anderson and his band o' Confederate raiders showed up, Wales had reached the point where he hit more'n he missed. And when he found out that Bloody Bill was aimin' to payback the Union and, in particular, the Redlegs, Wales told 'em he'd be joinin' up. Thereafter followed several years of guerilla fightin' as Anderson, Wales, and the rest of Anderson's raiders took the fight to the Union.

It all ended one day when Anderson's band was lured into an ambush. Anderson was fatally wounded in the ambush, and everyone but Josey Wales was captured. The Rebels were lined up and were prepared to be taken as prisoners of war. Instead, the Union soldiers turned a Gatling gun on the helpless Rebels. Josey raced in from the trees in time to kill a sizable portion of the Union camp all by his lonesome, and then he escaped with one of his former companions.

Naturally, the Bluebellies took sorta a dim view of the whole mess, and they offered a $5000 reward for the man what could bring in Josey Wales, dead or alive. And some of their spies managed to convince a few high-up folks in the Confederacy that Josey Wales betrayed Anderson's raiders, lured them into the ambush, and then killed 'em hisself. So the Confederacy also has out a $5000 reward on his head. Needless to say, Wales is right popular with a lot of bounty hunters, and there ain't many places where he ain't recognized.

Wales's whereabouts are unknown at the moment. The last verifiable sighting of Wales has him headin' south into Texas accompanied by an elderly Cherokee and a young Navajo squaw. Rumor has it that he's settled down and taken hisself a new young wife in some ghost town in south Texas, but the bounty hunters that go lookin' for him down there either come back empty handed or they don't come back at all...