Early in the 1780's refugees from the periodic flooding along the Mississippi River made their way north overland from the Pointe Coupee area to high ground along the Red River.  They found shelter from the rising waters on high ground among the Avoyelles Indians.  A small military post had been established in the area in the early days of Spanish rule but it remained sparsely populated.  In November of 1796, Bishop Luis de Penalver, the first bishop of Louisiana and the Floridas, visited the area.  A census count submitted by Colonel Carlos de Grand-Pre recorded 338 white settlers of both sexes and 105 Negroes.  Among the scattered Indian tribes there were 138 Pascagoulas, 144 Biloxis, 111 Tunicas and 135 Appalaches.  The Spanish Crown had granted 240 arpents of land for the erection of a church and cemetery in 1784 but no church had been built by the time of the bishop's visitation.  On Sunday, November 20th, 1796 the bishop administered the sacrament of Confirmation to a class of 109.  Among the families represented were:  Joffrion, Couvillion, Laborde, Tassin, Mayeaux, Bordelon, Lemoine, Gauthier, Roy, Ducote, St. Romain, Gaspard, Rabelais, Juneau, Chatelain and Grande-Pre.  The baptismal register for the Church of ''Nuestra Senor del Carmen" or Our Lady of Mount Carmel was entrusted to the first pastor, Fr. Juan Maguire, an Irish-born Carmelite friar and graduate of the University of Salamanca, in June of 1797.  He was succeeded as pastor by Fr. Juan Brady in 1798.  Fr. Brady served as pastor for the Avoyelles area as well as the scattered French settlements along the Ouchita River near Fort Miro, present day Monroe.

In 1803 Fr. Brady retired from the Avoyelles Post at the time of the Louisiana Purchase and went on to serve at Baton Rouge in Spanish 'West Florida'.  The small chapel of Our Lady of Mount Carmel was served periodically by visiting priests from Opelousas, Nacagdoches and Natchitoches.  Fr. Louis Buhot of the post at Opelousas entered the claims with the US Land Commission Office in Opelousas that saved the church lands in the Avoyelles.  The property was surveyed in may 1811 and title to the property was granted and confirmed by the state in 1813.  On November 14th, 1814 Fr. Michael Barrier took up his duties as pastor in the Avoyelles.  During his two year stay he baptized over 200 people.  In 1816 he was reassigned to the chruch at St. Martinville.  Fr. Maynes of Natchitoches, Fr. Flavius Rossi and Fr. marcellus Borella provided services intermittently at Mount Carmel between 1816 and 1822.  A new wave of immigration began in the Avoyelles as French refugees crossed the Atlantic after the fall of Napoleon.  Many of these were veterans of the Grande Armee.  For them the vast grass lands of the Avoyelles plain resembled the fought-over ground near Mansura, Egypt where they had been defeated in 1799.  Others with a more classical bent called the area around the church and cemetery - Hydropolis.

In February of 1818 Fr. Maynes of Natchitoches authorized subscriptions for the building of a new church in the Avoyelles to be dedicated to St. Joseph.  Six wardens or trustees were appointed by election:  Joseph Joffrion, Jean Baptiste Mayeaux, Jean Baptiste Rabalais, Francis Bordelon, Joseph Joffrion, Jr. and Cyprian Lacour.  By 1820 the white population of the Avoyelles numbered over 1400 souls but Fr. maynes left the area and returned to Texas. A new church would not erected until September, 1825.  In 1824 Bishop William DuBourg of New Orleans assigned Fr. Jean Emile Martin as pastor of the Avoyelles.  He found little on his arrival in the area.  The faith had all but withered away.  The small chapel was a 'mere cabanage' and there was no rectory.  Setting up a little lean-to shelter Fr. Jean Martin made due with cornbread and charity as he went about the work of rebuilding the parish.  In his first year he blessed 50 marriages and began to repair the church which was placed under the patronage of St. Paul the Apostle.  At the growing community of Marksville, north of the church and cemetery, Fr. Martin build a small chapel dedicated to St. Joseph on land donated by Pierre l'Eglise.  On his return visit in 1825 Bishop DuBourg praised the work of the pastor and people and confirmed a large class.  But Fr. Martin was a hard man of "stubborn and scrupulous disposition".  he quarreled with the wardens and parishioners and was eventually locked out of the church in April of 1832.  Bishop de Neckere of New Orleans tried to mediate with the trustees on the priest's behalf but they were firm in their decision.  Bishop de Neckere was forced to place the parish under interdict.  The chapel was closed - no sacraments could be celebrated, no baptisms or burials - until the trustees recognized the authority of the bishop to appoint pastors.  The interdict was lifted by Bisop Antoine Blanc in 1834 and Fr. Martin was reinstated as pastor.  He was reassigned to Pointe Coupee in 1835.

33 year-old, Fr. Louis Alaux, was assigned as pastor with a monthly salary of $40.  Fr. Alaux traveled south along Bayou de Glaises but few attended his masses.  parents refused to send their children to catechism and more than half the parish had never made first communion.  21 children made their First communion in August of 1835 in what would be Fr. Alaux's last act as pastor.  He lasted all of four months.  In 1836 Fr. Jean Martin returned and resummed the pastorate until 1840.  He began to draw up plans for a new church dedicated to St. Paul in September of 1837.  In 1840 Fr. Nicolas Francais was assigned as pator of St. Paul's.  He wrote Bishop Blanc:  "I am poorly housed, poorly fed and poorly paid . . . I do not think I can build a church here.  He would stay at his post for three years but the would return again for a brief time in 1844 after Fr. Chartier's departure.  During his tenure the ladies of the parish formed the Altar Society to attend to the upkeep of the sanctuary and altar linens.  Among the first ladies to answer the pastor's call were Mrs. leandre Bordelon, Mrs. leonine Coco, Mrs. Nelson Durand, Mrs. Marius Gauthier and Mrs. Joseph Roy.  A new church was finally begun in 1844 and in May of 1845 Bishop Blanc assigned Fr. Charles Dalloz as pastor.  By October of 1845 a new statue of the Blessed Virgin had been erected and guilded and the ceiling of the sanctuary was set to be painted and decorated with "heads of angels and a fresco of St. Paul".  A new bell, christened 'Marie Magdalene', was donated by Mr. Dominique Coco and Mrs. Mary Leonard Baillio.  The new church was finally finished at a cost of over $3600 and dedicated by Bishop Blanc in 1845.  At that ceremony the bishop confirmed a class of 80.

When word reached Bishop Blanc in 1849 that the trustees of St. Paul's had not paid Fr. Dalloz in over four years he ordered the young pastor to abandon the parish.  Cholera broke out in the area and Fr. Dalloz stayed to tend the sick.  On June 27th, 1849 Fr. Charles died as a result of tetanus.  He had stepped on a nail and wound was slow to heal.  Word reached him that a Negro woman had died and was in need of Christian burial.  The priest performed the ceremony but pressure on his foot reopened the wound.  Infection set in and he died at the age of 42.  He was buried behind the church he had completed on the 29th.  Fr. M. Francis Mazzerechelli, the associate in Alexandria, was assigned to succeed Fr. Dalloz.  he arrived on dcember 8th and was presented a bill by the wardens - $100 fro Fr. Dalloz's tomb.  Fr. Mazzerechelli paid the bills, reblocked the church's foundations and left the Avoyelles to return to Italy in May of 1850.  Fr. Hyacinthe Tumoine, 31 years old, was sent to replace him.  The 1850 census counted 4,059 whites and 5,267 blacks in the Avoyelles.  In his first year Fr. Tumoine baptized 78 persons; in 1851 193.  In 1852 the pews sold for $166 and Fr. Tumoine reported 65 communions on Holy Thursday.  There were 16 First Communions at Bayou de Glaises where Fr. Tumoine held regular catechism classes on Fridays.  On Sundays he went and taught catechism to the children of Marksville.

In 1853 all of North Louisiana was erected into a new diocese, the Diocese of Natchitoches.  Bishop Auguste Marie Martin, a native of St. Malo in Brittany and pastor of Natchitoches, was named bishop.  In 1854 he went ot France and recruited a numbe rof young clerics to come to work in his vast diocese.  Fr. Jean Beaulieu was ordained in natchitoches in 1855 and sent to Fr. Tumoine in Hydropolis.