Simply completed binging The English on Prime Video? Amazon’s Western introduced residence its transferring story of Girl Cornelia Locke (Emily Blunt), a mom operating the gauntlet to enact revenge on the person who prompted her son’s dying. It additionally turned out to be an excellent love story with ex-Pawnee Scout Eli Whipp (Chaske Spencer), set in probably the most extremely saturated desert panorama possible.
Amid the sweeping romantic music and beautiful cinematography, among the tougher particulars about what rival businessmen David Melmont (Rafe Spall) and Thomas Trafford (Tom Hughes) have been as much as might need been misplaced throughout the present’s two timelines. Let’s clear up our understanding of the whole lot that occurred within the beautiful action-packed, tension-laden restricted sequence.
Spoilers forward and a content material warning: sexual violence, suicide
Who killed Girl Cornelia Locke’s son?
It is clear from the outset that Cornelia, a fancily dressed Englishwoman with baggage of cash, has traveled to Kansas in 1890 on a revenge mission over her son’s killer. We do not uncover the precise id of the person till halfway via the sequence, after we meet the gnarly, immoral and decrease class David Melmont, a enterprise companion of Thomas Trafford, Cornelia’s lover in England who had proposed to marry her.
What have been Melmont and Trafford doing in Wyoming?
In 1875, 15 years earlier than Cornelia arrives in Kansas, Trafford and his males land in Chalk River, Wyoming, with hopes of beginning a cattle rearing enterprise. Within the Wild West, the place absolutely anything goes, the get together begins to show in opposition to itself as Melmont acts out in opposition to his class superior. Melmont finds himself extra at residence amongst a merciless, unbiased splinter group of the American military: Corporal Jerome McClintock and cousins Billy Myers and Timothy Flynn. The group goes rogue in its seek for Working Hawk, a distinguished fighter from the Cheyenne Native American tribe, who had killed and mutilated Myers’ brother Lonnie for trespassing on their lands.
What occurred on the Bloodbath at Chalk River?
Towards Trafford’s needs, Melmont informs the military of the whereabouts of the Cheyenne settlement and joins them in slaughtering all the boys, girls and kids in what turns into often called the Bloodbath at Chalk River. Days later, the 4 males are arrested over participating prostitutes at a brothel, a severe crime on the time. But Melmont and McClintock escape and journey to England. There, Melmont makes an attempt to rip-off Cornelia into giving him cash by claiming it was Trafford who had dedicated the heinous crimes and an enormous bounty had been issued in alternate for his life.

David Melmont (Rafe Spall) commits many atrocities.
Amazon Studios
How did Melmont kill Cornelia’s son?
Cornelia’s doubts about Melmont’s claims are confirmed in a letter from Trafford that reveals it was Melmont who was behind the abhorrent acts in America. When Melmont visits Cornelia’s home once more, she confronts him with the reality. Undeterred, Melmont rapes Cornelia and steals her cash earlier than returning to America with McClintock.
Cornelia’s horror is compounded by a number of parts: Trafford’s letter additionally informs her that he is determined to remain in America, bringing their relationship to an finish. On the brothel in America, Melmont and the military group contracted syphilis from a employee named Stella Shriver, who later grew to become a part of a “human freaks and oddities” enterprise after the an infection ravaged her look.
Melmont’s act of sexual violence not solely infects Cornelia with syphilis, however leaves her pregnant. Tragically, the sexually transmitted an infection passes onto their son. Within the image Cornelia retains of him within the locket round her neck, we see the boy’s look reveals indicators of “erosion of the gentle tissues and bone, significantly of the face,” Cornelia says in episode 6. The opposite section 4 results of syphilis she describes are “blindness, deafness, coronary heart defects, stroke, psychological madness, lastly dying.” Cornelia raised her boy with unconditional love till he died at 14.
The occasions in Chalk River led to Melmont infecting his organic son with lethal syphilis. In a nutshell, Melmont’s cold-blooded actions resulted in Cornelia’s son’s dying. After a few years, this led to Cornelia’s rage-filled mission to confront Melmont along with his crimes in opposition to her and her boy.

Thomas Trafford (Tom Hughes) travels to America to start out a cattle rearing enterprise.
Amazon Studios
What occurred to Thomas Trafford?
Up to now timeline, we see the difficulties Cornelia’s lover goes via to arrange a cattle breeding farm over the 15 years he spends in Wyoming. Companion Melmont deserted Trafford and ended up hanging gold in Colorado, utilizing his enterprise savvy to create a profitable buying and selling enterprise. He constructed a brand new city known as Hoxom on the exact same land the Bloodbath at Chalk River befell. His success not sufficient, Melmont nonetheless sought to carry Trafford to failure and organized the slaughters of his cows and calves.
After the bloodbath, military males Billy Myers and Timothy Flynn requested Trafford if they might be a part of his cattle breeding outfit. Despising them and their crimes, Trafford refused and marked the boys along with his branding iron. Melmont later purchased Myers and Flynn plots of land, and the pair shaped a rival cattle rearing enterprise to Trafford.
When Trafford tries to enlist the help of native Sheriff Robert Marshall in defending his cattle from Melmont, Marshall turns into distracted by the deaths of Myers, Flynn and Flynn’s spouse. Like Melmont, Myers and Flynn additionally contracted syphilis. Fearing the consequences of the an infection, Myers hanged himself. Flynn shot his spouse, who additionally exhibited marks of the an infection, earlier than turning the gun on himself.
Regardless of efficiently opening a cattle rearing enterprise in Caine County, close to Chalk River, Trafford believes the land to carry dangerous luck. In episode 6, through the 1890 timeline, Trafford’s supervisor, Clay Jackson, stories to Cornelia, Eli and the sheriff that Trafford drowned in a flash flood. The get together tried to avoid wasting Trafford by throwing him a rope, however presumably realizing his herd and life’s work was about to be destroyed, Trafford minimize himself free and allowed himself to drown. Jackson says that that is what Trafford needs, to turn out to be part of the place he opened.

In a bittersweet ending, Eli and Cornelia should half methods.
Amazon Studios
Why cannot Eli and Cornelia be collectively?
Regardless of forming an in depth bond and sharing a kiss, Cornelia’s an infection prevents her from changing into too near Eli. Eli should additionally go into hiding after absolutely taking the blame for Melmont’s dying, defending Cornelia and Martha Myers. The sheriff releases Eli, who will certainly be killed by the Hoxom townspeople if he turns into often called Melmont’s assassin, on the situation he leaves and by no means returns. In departing, Eli may at some point return residence to Nebraska, the place he was born, and reclaim “only a few acres” of land the federal government took from his Pawnee tribe. Because of the “Homestead Act,” there’s an opportunity the federal government will give Eli the land for his providers to the military. Earlier than he rides off, Cornelia provides Eli a phial of “the perfect” wheat seed, which he can doubtlessly develop on his reclaimed land as soon as he is safely out of hiding. Cornelia, in the meantime, should return to England and see out her subsequent journey.
What occurs to Cornelia and the boy White Moon?
Cornelia inadvertently finally ends up saving a younger boy named White Moon from bandit Black-Eyed Mog’s camp. Eli acknowledges the boy because the son of Working Hawk; within the opening scene of the present, on his final day within the American military, Eli witnessed troopers kill Working Hawk, however did not cease them. He did nevertheless play some half in stopping the military from capturing Working Hawk’s spouse and son, though the pair nonetheless really feel betrayed by Eli, though they originate from totally different tribes. When Eli takes Cornelia to a physician, Cornelia convinces the physician to deal with White Moon, handing over the past of her cash. He accepts her cash as backing into a brand new enterprise, “Flathead Jackson’s Wild West Present: True Tales of America! Past the reasonable.”
In 1903, 13 years after her journey in America and Melmont’s dying, Cornelia is exhibiting the section 4 results of syphilis on her face, a “disgrace” she hides beneath a black veil. Earlier than her imminent dying, she visits the physician’s Wild West present when it travels to Berkshire, England. She meets with an older White Moon, who remembers her and is aware of that her “disgrace” is not hers, however Melmont’s. White Moon appreciates seeing the world and making a dwelling within the “circus” by telling extra genuine tales of Native People. He retains the recollections of Cornelia’s beloved Eli alive by enjoying Main North and First Sergeant Eli Whipp who saved a “white lady.”