Morgan City is a small city in St. Mary and belittle St. Martin parishes in the U.S. State of Louisiana. The population was 12,404 at the 2010 census. Known for being “right in the middle of everywhere”, Morgan City is located 68 miles (109 km) southeast of Lafayette, 64 miles (103 km) south of Baton Rouge, and 86 miles (138 km) west of New Orleans

Morgan City sits upon the banks of the Atchafalaya River. The town was originally named “Tiger Island” by surveyors appointed by U.S. Secretary of War John Calhoun, because of a particular type of wild cat seen in the area. It was well along changed for a mature to “Brashear City,” named after Walter Brashear, a prominent Kentucky physician who had purchased large tracts of land and acquired numerous sugar mills in the area. It was incorporated in 1860.

During the American Civil War, the Star Fort of Fort Brashear was the larger of two works erected by the Union Army occupying the city to defend a Federal military depot and the town. During the Bayou Teche Campaign, on the night of June 22, 1863, 325 Confederates of Gen. A. A. Mouton’s command, led by Major Sherod Hunter, landed their skiffs and flats in the rear of the town. Attacking the neighboring day, they surprised and captured the city, taking 1,300 Union prisoners, 11 heavy siege guns, 2,500 stands of rifles, immense quantities of quartermaster, commissary and ordnance stores. They afterward captured 2,000 African Americans, between 200 and 300 wagons and tents, all while problem losses of only 3 killed, 18 wounded.

In 1876, the community’s read out was untouched to Morgan City in praise to Charles Morgan, a rail and steamship magnate who first dredged the Atchafalaya Bay Ship Channel to accommodate ocean-going vessels.