Walter Halloran

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Father Walter Halloran (September 21, 1921 – March 1, 2005) was a Jesuit Roman Catholic priest who, at the age of twenty-six, assisted in the exorcism of a thirteen year old Lutheran boy in St. Louis, Missouri who allegedly became possessed after using a Ouija board. This was the case that William Peter Blatty was inspired by when he wrote his novel The Exorcist.

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[edit] Life

Father Halloran was born in Jackson, Minnesota in 1921. He was the oldest of nine children. He became a student at the Campion Jesuit High School in Prairie du Chien, Wisconsin in 1934. He was a member of the school's football team. In 1941, he became a member of the Jesuit community. It was while studying at St. Louis University, in 1949, that he would be asked by Father William S. Bowdern to assist in the exorcism rite on a case, which would become famous, concerning a thirteen year old boy.

Father Bowdern just asked the young priest to hold down the violent boy as the rite of exorcism was read but the boy lashed out and broke his nose. Father Halloran would later relate that he saw lines and words written on the boy's body including the word, "hell," that the boy's bed was jumping up and down and that a bottle of Holy water flew off a table and smashed against the wall. Years later he would relate his observations in interviews and said that he believed the boy was a true case of possession. Although the weeks in which he helped with this case of possession would make him a reluctant minor celebrity he regarded the exorcism as just one event in his life and not the most important.

In 1954, Father Halloran was ordained and two years later began teaching theology and history at his old school the Campion Jesuit High boarding school in Prairie du Chien. While teaching there he also coached football.

In 1963 he moved to Marquette University where he taught history until 1966 when Father Halloran volunteered for chaplain duty with the U.S. Army. He first served in Germany, but in 1969, at the age of 48, he volunteered for paratrooper training and then for duty in Vietnam where he would say he saw more evil than in the boy's hospital bed back in 1949.

According to his brother John Halloran, he really wanted to work with the men. Father Halloran would helicopter in to the fighting zones, sometimes staying for days on end ministering to the soldiers. By the end of his service as a paratrooper chaplain in 1971, he had earned two Bronze Stars. After his service was over, he went back to St. Louis in 1972 to teach at St. Louis University High and to serve as assistant director of campus ministry and then as alumni director at St. Louis University.

Father Halloran would have a variety of assignments from then on, such as being an associate pastor in his hometown of Jackson, Minnesota and running a parish ministry in San Diego.

The 1980's and 1990's found him being interviewed by reporters, researchers and students alike, all asking him questions about the 1949 exorcism that he was involved with. He regarded the 1993 book Possessed by Thomas B. Allen to have the best interviews related to the case. A movie was made based on this book in which Michael McLachlan played Father Halloran as a young man. In the publicity run up to the airing of the film, various television shows covered the topic of demonic possession with both Father Halloran and Thomas B. Allen appearing in segments speaking about the case. In commenting about his experiences, he neither sensationalized the details nor discounted the seriousness of the boy's condition.

[edit] Death

In 2003, Father Halloran was diagnosed with cancer and retired to the St. Camillus Jesuit Community in Wauwatosa where he died on March 1, 2005. At the time of his death, he was the last surviving Jesuit who had assisted in the 1949 case.

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