Misplacing Don Diego De Vargas the First Time
A Santa Fe Lost but Not Forgotten Cemetery Tour

Take a walking tour through some of Santa Fe’s oldest “lost” graveyards.

Everywhere one walks in downtown Santa Fe, the Dead are there, under our feet.  Thousands still occupy their graves, resting perhaps uneasily, under the buildings, streets, sidewalks and parking lots of modern Santa Fe.  For thousands of years the people who lived and died at this sacred place along the Santa Fe River were being buried here, close by their families and community.  Who would have believed when they were laid to rest, that their graves could be so easily lost in a city that claims to revere her history and her Dead? 

Beginning on the plaza in the heart of Santa Fe and ending in the Barrio de Analco, take a tour of some of Santa Fe’s oldest “lost” Historic burial grounds.  Visit several of the places purported to contain Santa Fe’s most famous lost grave, that of Don Diego de Vargas.  Learn about efforts to document and protect all of Santa Fe’s “lost” Dead.

Nuestra Senora de La Casas Reales and Our Lady of Light Chapel (La Castrense)
On the north side of the plaza, now underneath the intersection of Palace Avenue and Washington Avenue, lie the remains of people buried under what was once the floor of the military chapel that was attached to the Palace of the Governors, Nuestra Senora de La Casas Reales. This burial site likely contains some the oldest graves of Spanish Colonial people in Santa Fe, back to the founding circa 1610.

Our Lady of Light Chapel (La Castrense) Camposanto

On the south side of the plaza, visit the Dead yet interred around what was Our Lady of Light Chapel (La Castrense). Active as a military and then community chapel between 1760 and 1859. Parish records of burials at La Castrense include some of 18th century Spanish Colonial Santa Fe’s most prominent citizens.

Parish Church of Saint Francis of Assisi
From the plaza we will walk to Cathedral Place to stand in the expansive composanto that was at the spiritual heart of Catholic Spanish Colonial Santa Fe. The first parish church, dedicated to St. Francis, was founded in 1610. The post-revolt “La Paroquia” was founded in 1714. For well over two centuries the parish church and camposanto accomodated the burial of the ordinary and extraordinary citizens of Santa Fe.

San Miguel Chapel and Camposanto
From the cathdral, walk south across the river to the San Miguel Chapel. This ancient mission on the south side of the Santa Fe River was one of the earliest consecrated Catholic spaces in Santa Fe. It served as the burial place for the residents of the Barrio de Analco and their clergy since the first iteration of this chapel was constructed circa 1620.

Old San Miguel (Saint Michael’s) Cemetery
At the end of the tour, stand in the heart of what was easily the largest 19th century Catholic burial ground in Santa Fe. The graves remaining in this cemetery are now possibly the most endangered of any in the city. Now under the parking lot of the PERA Building, this cemetery was founded by at least 1846, when the Dead had overflowed the subfloor spaces and camposantos of Santa Fe’s churches and chapels. Graves have been disturbed repeatedly during construction and utilities work in the area since the 1960’s and are still being disturbed to the present day.