History
In 1807 Governor Claiborne approved an act that established the original nineteen Louisiana parishes. Saint Landry Parish, also known as the Empire Parish, provided judicial and other governmental administrative services for most of southwest Louisiana. The parish, in addition, to its governmental bureaus, was the cattle kingdom of the United States, prior to the admission of Texas into the federal union. Its vast prairies produced abundant livestock herds that were driven to Washington, Louisiana (Old Church Landing) on the banks of Bayou Courtableau, and transported by steamboats to New Orleans and other metropolitan areas. Cotton, the sugar culture and other agricultural staples were a vital facet of the parishÂ’s economic life from the colonial era to the present time.
The civil parish covered the same area as the church parish of Saint Landry named in honor of the Bishop of Paris, 650-656 A.D. The early parish was bordered on the southeast by Saint Martin Parish, south by the Gulf of Mexico, west by the Sabine River, north by Natchitoches, Rapides, and Avoyelles Parishes, and east by the Atchafalaya River. The old Imperial Parish encompassed the modern parishes of Acadia, Allen, Beauregard, Calcasieu, Cameron, Evangeline, Jefferson Davis and Saint Landry.
Saint Landry Parish possesses a rich and diverse history. Comprising most of southwest Louisiana prior to 1840, it was an economic, political, and cultural crossroads. In 1764, the Spanish colonial government had established the Opelousas Post to protect its northern Caribbean frontier. The outpost did not hinder foreign encroachment, but rather its fertile soil and climate attracted Frenchmen, Spaniards, Anglo-Americans, and other ethnic groups to the old Spanish borderland frontier. In late 1862, with the fall of Baton Rouge and Port Hudson, the Louisiana Confederate State Government established itself at Opelousas. The Saint Landry Parish site, however, was short-lived, for General Nathaniel Banks and the United States Army entered the City of Opelousas in the spring and later in the fall of 1863. In short, the Opelousas Post and Saint Landry Parish historical records rival those of New Orleans and Mobile in their significance in the history and development of the Gulf Coast region.
