“Branded” starring Chuck Connors premiered as a mid-season program in January of 1965. “Branded” is the saga of Jason McCord, a Civil War officer who is the lone white survivor of the Battle Of Bitter Creek, a Little Big Horn-like massacre brought on by the mental deterioration of the General in command. It is commonly believed that McCord’s survival was due to cowardice, and after a court-martial, he is stripped of his rank and forced to leave the army.
The premise of “Branded” is similar to the plot of a “Rifleman”
episode titled “The Journey Back”, wherein a neighbor of Lucas McCain is wanted by the
army for having deserted, after finding himself the lone survivor of a similar famous
massacre--in this case, “Willow Creek”, and believing that he would be accused of
cowardice if found alive. The “Branded” premise is recounted in each episode during the
program’s introduction. In the theme song by Dominic Frontiere (lyrics by Alan Alch),
the tale is told of McCord’s survival of 
the Bitter Creek massacre and how he was
unfairly accused. The song plays over the scene of the ceremony in which McCord is
literally stripped of his rank, as his commander rips the decorations from his uniform and
breaks McCord’s sabre in half, tossing the bottom half out of the fort gate. McCord
stoically exits the fort. As the gates close behind him, he picks up the broken sabre and
examines it closely as he ponders his fate. Essentially exiled, McCord travels the west
from job to job, putting to use his army training as an engineer. Throughout, McCord is
in a sense running from his undeserved reputation as a coward, but wherever he goes, it
seems that his reputation has preceded him. Martyr-like, he suffers the outrages and
attacks in silence, refusing to tell the story that could redeem him in the eyes of the
public. Over the course of the series, many who start out hating McCord end up admiring
him, or at least giving him the benefit of the doubt, as they witness him demonstrate
courage and determination in the face of taunts and more deadly threats. Often McCord
encounters individuals who are themselves facing situations that require courage and
ultimately it is McCord whose actions inspire them to do the right thing. From time to
time McCord encounters old friends who have not lost faith in him. In “The Mission”, it
is in the form of Colonel 
Snow (Jon Lormer) who refused to believe the accusations
surrounding Bitter Creek. The Colonel introduces McCord to President Ulysses S. Grant
(William Bryant). President Grant would call upon McCord several times to go
undercover, usually putting his reputation and dismissal from the army as a means to gain
admission with groups who are at odds with the government in some manner. In “The
Coward Steps Aside”, Johnny Crawford appears as a young deputy who isn’t about to
take lessons in courage from Jason McCord when his town is threatened. This was the
first dramatic reunion of Connors and Crawford since “The Rifleman”, and it would be
some 25 years before the next. Johnny Crawford recalls the experience: “We were very
fond of each other. He was the reason I was doing the show. He saw an episode that I
could do and he said, ‘I want Johnny to play that part’. It was just fun playing a different
role with him”. The creator of the show, Larry Cohen stated, “Chuck Connors wanted to
give himself an entirely different look from “The Rifleman”, which I agreed was a good
idea. Connors said ‘We’ve got to come up with something like the rifle. A weapon that I
can play with’. So I came up with the 
broken sabre, which was cut down so he’d be able
to throw his sabre, use that in fights, and give us something that would be symbolic for
the show”.