Leadville Irish Miners’ Memorial

This outstanding tribute to Irish fortitude, both then and now, recognizes the 1100 immigrants buried in unmarked, sunken graves in the Catholic Pauper section of Evergreen Cemetery, most of whom were Irish.

The final phase of the memorial will be completed in August this year and there will be an official ribbon cutting event in Evergreen Cemetery in Leadville on Saturday, September 16th, 2023 beginning at 10am.
Learn more about the project from our FAQs.

We memorialize the Irish community that once inhabited the east side of Leadville. The Irish occupied the bottom rung of Leadville’s social ladder, worked the mines and smelters, loved, struggled, dreamed, and died young. In the early 1880s, nearly 3,000 Irish-born people lived in Leadville and surrounding gulches, scratching out a bare existence, and then moving on to Denver, Cripple Creek, Butte, and the west coast. Twice they led massive strikes, walking out of the sliver mines and bringing the Colorado economy to a stop. They demanded a raise from $3 to $4/day, an 8 hr. workday, better safety codes, and the right to organize a union.

Please consider supporting this effort to honor the memory of those Irish immigrants who came to Colorado in search of a better life, who died here trying to find it, and who deserve not to be forgotten! Click on the button below to donate directly to our Leadville Irish Miner’s Memorial fund. Thank you for your support.

Nearly half of the roughly 1,400 umarked graves are children and the average age of those buried there is twenty three. This memorial is a symbol of recognition of their humanity, their lives, their dreams, and their names, in hopes that their stories might continue.