Liberia: identifying a military memorial

[<k>]

Liberia, 5 dollars, 1985.

The design above was first issued in 1982 then again in 1985. It commemorates the seizure of power by Samuel Doe and his People's Redemption Council and shows a military memorial. Using Google, I have been unable to find such a statue. Can anybody help?

The design was modelled by Derek Gorringe of the Royal Mint, from sketches supplied by Liberia.

[africancoins]

Clue - if Doe saw to it being put up in a city where there would later be wars etc.. then maybe it was not in existence for very long.

Google books is sometimes more useful for the past especially when image search fails.

Quotes from book preview results...

Book:- The Mask of Anarchy Updated Edition: The Destruction of Liberia and the...

...hundreds of AFL forces were holding out in the Executive Mansion, firing at the building from the University of Liberia which stands just a few hundred yards away and by the Statue of the Unknown Soldier, a monument to the AFL erected by Doe after the military coup which brought him to power in 1980...

same book...

The Statue of the Unknown Soldier.. ..was to remain standing until it was finished off by a few direct hits during heavy fighting in April 1996.

.......

Book:- Civil-military Relations, Nation Building, and National Identity...

On the first anniversary of the coup, Doe unveiled a $41,000 heroes' monument, erected outside the Executive Mansion. Known as the Statue of the Unknown Soldier, the monument depicted a soldier with fixed bayonet. On the occasion of the second anniversary of the Revolution, a five-dollar Liberia coin with a replica of the soldier statue was minted and circulated.

Book:- Liberia: The Quest for Democracy

The statue of a soldier with fixed bayonet, which stands in the middle of the road on Capitol Hill between the Executive Mansion and the Capitol is the most prominent and most frequently visited statue in the city.

..............

Even with the info above I was still failing in attempts to find an images on google images... but perhaps someone can put a bit more effort into that.

Thanks Mr Paul Baker

[<k>]

Thanks, Paul. Excellent detective work. Seems a pretty solid identification. I can't find an image either, unfortunately.

[andyg]

I too found reference to that - but no picture.

Apparently Charles Taylor had it removed in 1996.
The executive mansion is now derelict it seems.

[eurocoin]

Came across this, might have been andyg's source too although the year of its demolition differs:

Just outside the walled grounds of the mansion there used to be a statue commemorating Liberia's Unknown Soldier. It was destroyed last May [1998] during a purification rite ordered by President Taylor to rid the mansion of evil spirits. There were "persistent reports," Bishop Alfred Reeves, one of the President's senior religious advisers, says, that a child had been buried alive under the monument as a sacrifice. "We had said this mansion needed to be cleansed ever since the assassination of President Tolbert," Reeves says. "We said it needed to be consecrated, but no one really listened to the church until Mr. Taylor came to power."

As yet no picture.