HauntBound archive · catalog record
Reported phenomena — as catalogued
A downtown Santa Fe hotel inside the old St. Vincent Hospital, where guests report a crying boy on the third floor
228 E Palace Ave, Santa Fe, NM 87501
Research updated June 2026
Age
All Ages
Cost
$$$
Hotel room rates vary by season; typically a mid-to-upper range downtown rate. Day visitors can view the lobby and historic exterior at no cost.
Access
Wheelchair OK
Paved downtown sidewalks; accessible lobby and elevators
Equipment
Photos OK
Est. 1977 · Sisters of Charity Hospital Site · St. Vincent Hospital (until 1977) · Adaptive Reuse of a Historic Hospital · Santa Fe Plaza District
In 1865 Archbishop Jean Baptiste Lamy invited the Sisters of Charity, a nursing and teaching order from Cincinnati, to Santa Fe, and land near the plaza was deeded to them for hospitals, sanatoria and orphanages. The building that anchors today's Drury Plaza Hotel functioned as St. Vincent Hospital, serving the city for decades.
The hospital operated in the building until 1977, after which it housed offices of the New Mexico Department of Cultural Affairs. The structure sat partly vacant for years before the Drury hotel company undertook a major historic renovation, preserving elements of the old hospital while converting the interior into roughly 180 guest rooms. The hotel opened in 2014, two blocks from the Santa Fe Plaza.
The building's century of use as a hospital -- a place of birth, illness and death -- is the backdrop for the ghost stories now attached to it. Hotel and tourism materials lean into the history rather than hiding it, and the property has become one of the sites featured in Santa Fe haunted-hotel coverage.
The St. Vincent name continues in Santa Fe through the modern CHRISTUS St. Vincent Regional Medical Center, the successor to the Sisters of Charity hospital, which marked 150 years of care in the city.
Sources
The best-known story at the Drury concerns Room 311 and the third floor. As the legend is told in Santa Fe, the room is associated with the muffled cries of a young boy who died in the building during its hospital years, and hotel staff are said to have at times kept the room out of the rotation. Reports from guests and employees also describe slamming doors, flickering lights and the sound of a child crying elsewhere on the upper floors, with a separate figure reported on the fourth floor.
The property drew wider attention in January 2022, when a visiting family said they experienced unexplained activity during their stay; their account was picked up in a CNN regional report carried by television stations around the country, which gave the hotel's reputation a national airing.
New Mexico Magazine has also written about the building's "institutional memories," connecting the modern guest reports to the structure's decades as St. Vincent Hospital, a setting where many people were born and many died. As with most hotel hauntings, the accounts are anecdotal and rely on guest and staff testimony rather than formal investigation, but the volume and consistency of the third-floor stories keep the Drury near the top of Santa Fe's haunted-lodging lists.
Notable Entities
Media Appearances
Book a room in the renovated St. Vincent Hospital building, two blocks from the plaza. The third floor is the focus of the guest ghost reports; the rooftop pool and bar look out over the cathedral. The hospital history is part of the building's marketing and decor.
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