In 1843, Père Antoine Désiré Mégret, a Capuchin missionary, purchased the land that was to become Abbeville for $900. 

Formerly called La Chapelle, Father Megret named the town after Abbéville, his hometown in the Picardy region of France. 

Two people were living on the land at that time, Joseph LeBlanc and his wife Isabelle Broussard, whose former home Megret converted into the first Church. The original church burned down in 1854 and St. Mary Magdalen Catholic Church now stands at the same location.

The residents who settled the town were descendants of the Acadians from Nova Scotia who moved to the area around 1766 to 1775.  It was incorporated in 1850 and is the parish seat of Vermilion Parish, which calls itself “the most Cajun place on Earth,” claiming the highest concentration of residents with Acadian ancestry.

Father Megret modeled his original plan for the village after a French Provincial village. In a map he made in 1846, the town was 38 to 40 acres, bounded on the north by St. Victor Boulevard, on the south by Lafayette Boulevard, on the east by “the Sisters of Charity,” and on the west by Bayou Vermilion.

Around 12,000 people live in Abbeville today. A statue in memory of Father Megret stands in Magdalen Square downtown, near the Vermillion Parish Courthouse. 

Abbeville is home to several festivals, including the Giant Omelette Celebration, which will be held for the 40th time this year on Nov. 2 and 3. 

According to legend, when Napoleon and his army were traveling through the south of France, they decided to rest for the night near the town of Bessieres. Napoleon feasted on an omelette prepared by a local innkeeper. 

He liked it so much, he ordered the townspeople to gather all the eggs in the village and to prepare a huge omelette for his army the next day. From this beginning, the omelette became a tradition to feed the poor of the village at Easter. 

In April of 1985, three members of the Chamber of Commerce (Emery “Bichon” Toups, Tracy Kays and Sheri Meaux) attended the Easter Omelette Festival in Bessieres. They returned home with the determination to bring Abbeville closer to its French Heritage by hosting an omelette festival and joining the sisterhood of cities that celebrate the omelette. 

The event kicks off on Saturday morning, and on Sunday afternoon, some 5,000 eggs (plus one for each year the festival has been held) are used to create a massive omelette. Other ingredients include 50 pounds of onions, 75 bell peppers, 52 pounds of butter and 15 pounds of crawfish tails.  

A Children’s Omelette, featuring a mere 600 eggs, also is prepared by junior chefs as part of the festivities.

Editor’s note: The information for this piece came from the City of Abbeville and the Giant Omelette Celebration. 

This piece first ran in the July 25, 2024 edition of LaPolitics Weekly. Wish you could have read it then? Subscribe today!