The Guns of Fort Petticoat is a 1957 western film directed by George Marshall.
Lt. Frank Hewitt (Audie Murphy) fights for the Union despite his Texan origins, serving in the US Cavalry. When Colonel John Chivington (Ainslie Pryor) gives orders for an attack that would become the Sand Creek massacre
, Frank fears that the reprisals will affect his home and deserts to warn the locals. Frank is regarded as a traitor and his warnings are ignored until a woman is murdered by Comanches. From there, Frank rallies a group of women and trains them to be able to fight back against the looming threat.
Tropes:
- Asshole Victim: Emmet Kettle is a despicable coward and manipulator, so it's not very sad when he runs into three outlaws and gets murdered by them after he (falsely) convinces them there's gold in the town he left behind.
- Dirty Coward: Emmett is the only capable man left in the town and he does everything he can to get out of participating in its defense, up to convincing one of the women of his affections and then heartlessly throwing her off after she helps him escape prison.
- Get A Hold Of Yourself Man: Frank slaps one of the women to calm her down when she gets hysterical after seeing another murdered by the Indians.
- Love Triangle: Frank's affections are split between his childhood sweetheart Stella Leatham, who married a Confederate soldier after Frank left to go fight for the Union, and Anne Martin, a spitfire tomboy he first meets when he's warning everyone. As heroic characters having an extramarital affair was a no-no in a 1957 American movie, Anne wins Frank's heart in the end, while he tells Stella that the two of them together would be wrong.
- Training the Peaceful Villagers: Frank trains a large group of village women to fight Indian raiders, a necessity since most of the town's male populace is off fighting in the Civil War.
