Hugh Tallant (Alan Ladd) is a Revolutionary War era student and world traveler who winds up in the belly of an English prison ship bound for Australia. The co-ed prison population hatches a plan of mutiny, but is discovered by the crew and captain. Tallant is punished in a unique way that builds his ranks of sympathizers. As if life and torture on a ship wasn't enough, Tallant is delivered to prison in South Wales where patience is thin, and the plague is thick.