To its curative powers many crutches and ex voto objects, hung round the well, as in the Lourdes Grot, bear ample witness.
Among its institutions are the Ferguson Library (1882; with 16,000 volumes in 1909), several private schools, a Y.M.C.A., the Stamford Hospital (private, 1893), two private sanatoria, the Convent of our Lady of Lourdes, St John's Church House, a day nursery (1902), with dispensary and kindergarten, and the Stamford Children's Home (1895).
The present fame of Lourdes is entirely associated with this grotto, where the Virgin Mary is believed in the Roman Catholic world to have revealed herself repeatedly to a peasant girl named Bernadette Soubirous in 1858.
The origin of Lourdes is uncertain.
Since the visions of Bernadette Soubirous, their authentication by a commission of enquiry appointed by the bishop of Tarbes, and the authorization by the pope of the cult of Our Lady of Lourdes, the quarter on the left bank of the Gave has sprung up and it is estimated that 600,000 pilgrims annually visit the town.
