Louis Bouhort and his wife Crois Bouhort were neighbours of the Soubirous family and personally acquainted with Bernadette. Their two-year-old daughter Justine, born sickly, had wasted away after a bout of cholera the previous winter; by July 1858 she was unable to walk, refused all food, and was dying. The doctor had told them to prepare for her end.
On July 6, 1858, in despair, Madame Bouhort wrapped Justine in a shawl, ran with her to the new grotto, and — without permission, without ritual — plunged the dying child into the icy spring water for a quarter of an hour. Onlookers were horrified, believing she was killing the child. She brought Justine home; the next morning Justine asked for soup, sat up, and within days was walking. She lived to 80 years of age. Recognised in the 1862 episcopal decree as one of the seven first miracles. Justine herself bore witness to the cure at the canonisation of Bernadette in 1933 — a living seventy-five-year-old testimony.