The French battled the native American tribes from 1699 until 1718 for control of South Louisiana and the New Orleans area.  The battle for Louisiana was only a small footnote in the much larger war the French were waging with the British for control of North America.

Wiped out by disease and warfare the Indians around New Orleans were enslaved and marginalized when the city was founded. Virtually no trace of Native American influence remains in the city today. The nearest Indian casino is over 100 miles away.

The Chitimacha Indians had lived in Louisiana for over 6,000 years. Their population may have been as high as twenty thousand before European diseases introduced by Spanish explorers began to take their toll. Living in 15 main villages across southeast Louisiana their main groups included the Chawasha, Washa, Yagenechito and the Chitimacha themselves.

The French under Bienville wiped them out. They left fewer than half living out in the swamps south of Lafayette. Alcohol, disease and the Acadian immigration further reduced this population to the point where only 51 Chitimacha remained in 1930.

The Chitimacha population is now found in St Mary Parish at Charenton, LA, about 60 miles west of New Orleans and about 20 miles south east of Lafayette. Today the 720 registered Chitimacha tribe members live in St. Mary Parish and own the company managing the Baker Louisiana Renaissance Park FEMA trailer site.