"Where the chapel now stands, there used to be nothing more than wasteland and thorny shrubs. One day, a young girl found a 'beautiful doll' under a bush while playing. When she happily showed the find to her mother, she quickly saw that it was no ordinary doll and carefully put it away. There was great surprise when the find appeared to have disappeared the next day. The girl went looking again and found the doll again in the same place near the bush where she had found it the day before. This miraculous story was told to the priest, who decided to take the doll in procession to the parish church. The doll was taken to the church three times and three times it returned to the wood bush. They knew no better than to build a chapel at the place where Mary clearly wanted to be venerated." The legend remains primarily an oral tradition, but official documents from 1650 also speak of a 'miraculous bell blanket' in an 'old chapel'. No archive has been preserved from the earliest period and the construction of the first chapel. The construction of the second chapel in 1650 was documented. It is said that the entire construction of the chapel was paid for with the donations of pilgrims. The first stone was laid by Waltman van Dyck. He would remain pastor in Minderhout for 28 years.