About 200 destitute Acadians, former prisoners of the British in Halifax, Nova Scotia, arrived in New Orleans in February 1765 and were offered fertile land in the Attakapas District of what is now south-central Louisiana. They reached Bayou Teche in May to settle a region soon called Nouvelle-Acadie, but at least 39 died soon after in an epidemic and some families later relocated to land along the Mississippi River. Most remained on the oxbow of the Teche called Fausse Pointe, centered around present-day Loreauville, where they tended crops, raised cattle, and grew in numbers. Some moved north along the Teche in 1770-1771 to establish another settlement at what is now the village of Parks, and families from these two communities began to spread in 1776 to the upper and lower Teche and to Bayous Tortue, Vermilion, and Carencro. From there, new generations of Acadians populated the vast prairies of southwestern Louisiana, and the Acadians of Fausse Pointe left a lasting mark on local culture and history, with descendants now living in south Louisiana's bayou country and along the central Gulf Coast.