Bernadette's grandfather, the miller of Boly, lost his life through an accident. His wife remained alone with her four children and the work in the mill. That's why she accepted François Soubirous, who want to merry her very young daughter Louise, as her son-in-law. It was a love marriage, one where harmony and love will live forever, in spite of the hard resistance and attempts from the outside to create trouble.

On January 7th 1844 their first child was born: Bernadette. After her there were six more children, but three of them would die very young. Bernadette herself was never healthy, she was suffering from asthma. Bernadette always had strong feelings about her home, her parents and her sisters and brothers.

The business of the mill of Boly was getting worse, François Soubirous wasn't capable to run the business itself. The customers were too well served. While their corn was crushed, Louise was spoiling them with plenty food and drink. But the quality of the delivered flour wasn't good anymore, because of the bad condition of the mill. The customers therefore became more rare. In the end the family Soubirous was forced to leave the mill of Boly and they had to move to much poorer living conditions.

François became a day labourer. His work was poorly paid and he wasn't able to support his family. Louise also tried to earn some money by working out while Bernadette looked after the little children. But it was not this trouble alone, shame would be their part too. In the night of 26 march 1857 two bags of flour were stolen and of course the suspect was Soubirous: 'He is in trouble, he mustl be the thief', the baker mentioned. François Soubirous was arrested, but after eight days he was released again, there was not sufficient evidence. After this incident it became more difficult to find a job. This way the family Soubirous became poorer and poorer.

Bernadette and Bartrès.

In that same year Marie Laguës-Aravant (a girlfriend of Louise and Bernadette's nurse) came, whit the proposal to take the little asthmatic girl to her farmstead in Bartrès. There she could have a healthier life than in the whet and dark hous at Lourdes and earn some money as well. Her parents agreed, it was one little mouth less to feed. There was a lot of work at the farm, life wasn't easy and Bernadette who was learning the catechism to prepare her for her first communion hadn't often the opportunity for that. She was send to the meadow with the sheep from early in the morning until late in the evening.

Marie Laguës tried to teach the catechism to the little one her self, but this had no effect. Most of the time the child was alone with her sheep in the meadow. Bernadette was pious, she always had her rosary with her and prayed. She didn't know any other prayers. In December the youngest child on the farm died. Life became unbearable for Bernadette and she wished to go home. Around Christmas she asked for permission to go home, also to go to school and to do her first communion.

Bernadette during the apparitions.

Whit the permission of her parents she left the family Laguës around the 20th of January. She found her family back in the poorest hous in town, the disbanded 'Cachot', the former jail, which was uninhabitable, even for criminals. The moment when Mary needed this child to speak trough her to the world came closer. The first appearance at Lourdes was at the 11th of February 1858. During and after the apparitions Bernadette was the subject of interest, admiration and... aversion!

Her parents also had a hard time, how can poor people defend themselves against threatening public power! But Bernadette still remained her self, simple, sincere and God fearing. For the questioner from the public as well as from the church, she always remained calm and unprejudiced, some times with a little humour and even with firm defense against indelicate obtrusion, while she told the course of the apparitions.

In this period her personal decision to become a nun was growing in Bernadette, finally she choose for the sisters of Nevers, because her health wasn't suitable for strict and heavy rules, she liked to take care of the sick people and 'because no one has forced me to go'.

Bernadette at Nevers.

Seven years later, in 1865, Bernadette became a postulant in the cloister of the Sisters of Charity of Nevers at Lourdes, where she was an inhabitant. She took leave of her dearest grotto at the 4th of July 1866, before she was going to the motherhouse at Nevers. She left Lourdes and her beloved family forever, who in the meantime, with the help of the dean of Lourdes, were living in the millhouse of Lacadé. At the Sisters of Charity of Nevers, Bernadette lived on known by her Christian name, Soeur Marie-Bernarde.

At the beginning of here novitiate Bernadette was asked, in front of the gathered cloister community, for the story about the apparitions. After that she was told never to talk about it again. With somewhat exaggerated trouble, some of her prioresses, seemed to be trying almost anything to keep her humble and belittled. She suffered this humiliation, but accepted it magnanimously, her whole life she kept her cheerfulness.

On the day of her cloister vows the bishop gave her the order: 'pray'. She was appointed on the sick ward where she seemed to be a very good nurse. But she herself was ill many times, except for the asthma, she got tuberculosis, osteoporosis and open wounds that caused her suffering and destroyed her body. In body and mind she experienced day after day what Mary asked in Lourdes: 'Pray for the sinners, do penance'.

On the 16th of April 1879, the Wednesday after Easter she died, 35 years old. On request from Pope Pius IX and the bishop of Lourdes she confirmed under oath her earlier explanation about the events at Massabielle. After a long and strict process, as ordered from the church regulations. Pope Pius XI declared Bernadette a Saint on the 8th of December 1933. Her body, that was kept in perfect condition, lies in state, in a glass shrine in the chapel of the cloister at Nevers.