Column South (1953)

Audie Murphy: Lt. Jed Sayre

Photos 

Quotes 

• Capt. Lee Whitlock : The time may come, Lieutenant, when the North and the South are at each other's throat. But as of right now, there's no war being fought. We are all still in the same army.

  Lt. Jed Sayre : I'm glad you feel that way, sir.

  Capt. Lee Whitlock : That's the way I expect every officer and man in this post to feel. And if they don't feel it, they can act it.

• Marcy Whitlock : Listen carefully. I don't care if your friend is the most chief in the entire West. To me, he's just a redskin savage, and I can't stand the stench long enough to stay in the same room with him.

  Lt. Jed Sayre : It wasn't him. You just got a good whiff of your own soul. And lady, all the perfume in the world wouldn't cover it up.

• Lt. Jed Sayre : Then the peace is strong, Menquito?

  Menguito : It will always be strong so long as there are men with strong minds to guard it well.

• Lt. Jed Sayre : My orders are to move you out.

  Menguito : You speak of a place where vultures grow fat from the bodies of those who die without food in winter and without water in summer. This is our home. We will not move.

  Lt. Jed Sayre : Here me well, Menquito. If you haven't given the word to your people by the time that cloud passes the sun, I'll open fire!

• Lt. Jed Sayre : The point is, I don't think Barney was murdered by a Navajo or any other Indian.

  Capt. Lee Whitlock : Well, how can you say that? Half the man's head was gone!

  Lt. Jed Sayre : You didn't see an arrow sticking in him, did you?

  Capt. Lee Whitlock : Proving what?

  Lt. Jed Sayre : Proving this: an Indian may scalp a man, but he'll always stick an arrow in the body. It's superstition. It's supposed to pin the spirit to the corpse so it won't go rising up and haunting the guilty Indian or his friends.