Following the death of his parents from the plague, American “Tallant” (Alan Ladd) came back to the mother country only to get embroiled with a crooked inheritance agent and find himself found guilty of stealing his own cash! Transportation was the order of the day, so he is imprisoned in the ship of “Capt. Gilbert” (James Mason) and off they set on the eight month voyage to New South Wales. En route, it soon appears that “Gilbert” might have learned the arts of seamanship from Captain Bligh, so when the decent young “Tallant” falls in with the enigmatic “Sally” (Patricia Medina) he ends up…