Episode 13: "The Demon in the Belfry"
American Hauntings Podcast
Cody Beck and Troy Taylor
4.8 • 1.6K Ratings
🗓️ 27 February 2026
⏱️ 31 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
On Easter Sunday, April 13, 1895, parishioners at the Emmanuel Baptist Church in San Francisco were shocked when a closet was opened that contained the mutilated body of a young woman. Police detectives who were summoned to the church expected the corpse to belong to a 20-year-old woman named Blanche Lamont, a member of the church’s congregation who had gone missing 10 days earlier.
But it wasn’t her. Instead, the dead woman was 21-year-old Minnie Williams, who was also a member of the church.
And that wasn’t all the two young women had in common. Both had last been seen with the church’s handsome and well-liked Sunday School Superintendent, a man named Theo Durrant – who soon earned a nickname from the press. They called him “The Demon in the Belfry,” because it was almost impossible for anyone to believe that the brutal murders could be the work of an ordinary man.
He had to be one of the Devil’s minions, escaped from the fiery pits of Hell.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | On Easter Sunday, April 13, 1895, parishioners at the Emanuel Baptist Church in San Francisco |
| 0:13.5 | were preparing for the morning service when someone opened a closet in the church library |
| 0:19.6 | and found the mutilated body of a young woman. |
| 0:23.8 | She had been strangled and stabbed. Her wrists slashed so deeply that her hands were nearly |
| 0:29.8 | severed from her wrists. Cloth torn from her undergarments had been stuffed down her throat |
| 0:36.0 | and later examinations revealed |
| 0:38.2 | she'd been raped. The police detectives who were summoned to the church expected the corpse to |
| 0:44.0 | belong to a 20-year-old woman named Blanche Lamont, a member of the church's congregation who'd gone |
| 0:50.5 | missing 10 days earlier. But it wasn't her. Instead, the dead woman was 21-year-old |
| 0:57.9 | Minnie Williams, who was also a member of the church, and that wasn't all the two young women |
| 1:03.8 | had in common. Both of them had known and perhaps been romantically involved with the church's handsome and well-liked |
| 1:13.0 | Sunday school superintendent, a man named Theo Durant. Soon, Durant would become better known |
| 1:21.0 | by the moniker that was given to him by the San Francisco Press. In the lurid headlines that |
| 1:26.9 | appeared, he was dubbed the demon in the belfry. |
| 1:31.3 | Perhaps because it was almost impossible for anyone to believe that the brutal murders could be |
| 1:37.6 | the work of an ordinary man. |
| 1:40.4 | In the heated religious atmosphere of the nation at the time, it was much easier to believe the crime had been a bloody deed, carried out by one of the minions of the devil, somehow escaped from the pits of hell. |
| 1:59.0 | Welcome to American Nightmares, the podcast dedicated to America's history of horror. |
| 2:04.1 | Through sinister tales of murder, madness, mayhem, spirits, scandals and sins, |
| 2:09.8 | I'll be presenting the origins of American terror with true accounts of diabolical witches, |
| 2:15.8 | murderous madmen, haunted houses, death and dying, and stories of revenge and despair that have been torn from the pages of our haunted past. |
| 2:25.4 | As you're aware from previous episodes, our journey back in time is currently exploring the diabolical figure of the devil, |
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