Chapter 1
WAKE UP CALL
April 12, 1980
Monrovia, Liberia
The sound of machine gun fire in the distance jolted me awake just before 7 a.m. Assuming it was someone shooting stray dogs in the neighborhood I rolled over and tried to get some badly needed sleep. A few minutes later the phone interrupted my attempt at more rest. It was my neighbor, Jane. She had a startling explanation for the gunfire. "I heard there was a military coup last night in Monrovia. The whole Liberian government is in upheaval. Jim's at the hospital. Please come across the street to our house right away."
As a visiting fourth year medical student I was pretty flexible but certainly was not prepared for this. While praying furiously, I quickly showered, shaved and dressed. Unsure of what lay ahead for the day I took my Bible, a textbook and my camera. In a crouch I scampered from the mission guesthouse across the dusty road to Jane's house.
Jane and I cautiously peered out the windows toward the main road to Monrovia. We heard more machine gun bursts and saw several soldiers dressed in green uniforms holding machine guns as they walked along the road. Several Armed Forces of Liberia (AFL) soldiers went to the mission director's house and demanded, "Turn on your ELWA radio station." They wanted to make an announcement to the world about the coup and knew our short wave and medium wave transmitters were the best international media. When the mission director said he did not personally know how to turn on the radio ELWA transmitters, the soldiers took him at gunpoint to the radio manager's house. After waking him, the soldiers escorted the missionary men to the radio studio building several hundred yards from our house.
Jane and I began calling the other missionaries on the 137 acre campus but no one knew much more than we did. We kept low and out of sight in the house but were fearful about what was happening to our staff at the studio building. Eventually ELWA radio began broadcasting with the playing of the Liberian national anthem. Amidst confusion in the background, the soldiers read their announcements. Several soldiers spoke, some sounding drunk and confused. They explained that 28 year old Master Sergeant Samuel Doe of the People's Redemption Party had taken over the government. The catch phrase in this startling announcement was, "in the cause of the people the struggle continues."
Radio ELWA was under their control and Master Sergeant Doe screened all information before it was aired. This severely restricted what we could broadcast. Most of the day they played military march songs with an occasional news bulletin.
Over the next several hours we saw many trucks jammed with soldiers race onto the ELWA campus to the radio studio building. The soldiers set up a barricade in the road in front of the studio to control traffic in the area and settled in.
Throughout the day machine-guns fired from every direction around the campus. Reports began to filter in from Monrovia about irresponsible acts of the drunken soldiers. They were stopping cars along the roads, commandeering the vehicles for their personal use. They held people at gunpoint for food and money and raided houses at random. Things became quieter on our campus later in the day but the mission leaders urged all missionaries to stay on campus until the situation settled down. Although some of the 60 missionaries on the ELWA compound were frightened, most were amazingly calm and seemed to take it in stride.
Around 9 a.m. I went to the hospital to see if I could help. After suturing several minor gunshot wound lacerations in the emergency room, I was thrilled to be asked to scrub with the surgeon, Dr. Young, on a major case - a man whose left kidney had been shattered by two bullets lodged on the right edge of his spinal cord. This required extensive exploratory surgery. The patient woke up several times during the surgery and grabbed me on the bottom until we got him settled down with more anesthetic.
After finishing this surgery I went back to the emergency room and "cleaned" it out by taking care of the remaining patients. We weren't sure how many wounded we'd see in the coming days but I had already handled more war wounds than during my entire medical school career.
The BBC radio later announced that Samuel Doe's "People's Redemption Council" (PRC) had assassinated President Tolbert in his bedroom at the presidential palace - the Mansion - and was holding Tolbert's wife captive. Interestingly, they called the U.S. and Soviet ambassadors to come to the presidential mansion to help them form the new government. Many around the world were amazed that a group of only 17 soldiers could pull off a coup. How they organized themselves enough to kill President Tolbert was a mystery.
The ELWA compound was staffed by missionaries who watched over the radio production, teachers for the missionaries' children, support personnel for maintenance services, medical staff for the hospital and administrative staff. Some other missionaries, primarily involved with the local churches, used the compound as their base of operations. On the compound we had 24 hour electricity, running potable water, trash collection and a security force. Without warning, the sounds and sights of war suddenly shattered this idyllic missionary community. This kind of hostility was foreign to our understanding of the temperament of the Liberian people. In spite of the shooting, unruly soldiers, restrictive curfew and political unrest, there was never any mention of leaving. The idea never crossed my mind. We thought the unrest would be short lived and hoped life would soon be back to normal.
While having dinner that evening the emergency room nurse called me to evaluate two men who had gunshot wounds. Violating the curfew requiring everyone to stay in their house after 6 p.m., I drove my motorbike to the hospital. The men had been carrying an air conditioner along the road when an old soldier met them. He thought they were looting so he shot them both in the legs. In spite of their hysteria over the incident, their wounds were relatively minor. During my evaluation of these men, army men barged in and out of the emergency room yelling and cursing at each other. I finished sewing the injured men's lacerations and soon had the men out of the emergency room and on their way. It was my first encounter with AFL soldiers but was not to be my last.
Around 9 p.m. I jumped on my small motorbike and drove back to my room about 1/4 mile from the hospital. After talking to Jim and Jane and thinking through the uncertainties of our situation, I decided to stay the night with them. The nurse called again a short while later for me to see another man who had been shot. He had been outside his house with his family when the soldiers came around 5:30 p.m. to enforce the new 6 p.m. curfew. He was leaning over to take some of his children inside when he was shot in his backside. His wound was as big as my fist. I knew I needed help and sent for Dr. Young. We gave the man a spinal anesthetic and after packing the wound with gauze the bleeding stopped.
I finally got back to the house at 11 p.m. only to be called again 30 minutes later because of a child who was having difficulty breathing. The child had been "stuffed" by his mother. Stuffing is a custom practiced throughout Liberia. If a child has diarrhea or vomiting, the mother lays the child on her lap with the head down. Then she "stuffs" the child's mouth with food, hay, straw and all sorts of "medicine" to stop the child from vomiting. Unfortunately many children do not survive this treatment. I admitted the child into the hospital and started her on intravenous fluids and antibiotics.
Back home again I slept for a few minutes until my next call at 1:30 a.m. This time it was to help a man who had an eyelid laceration from an automobile accident. Liberians drove like the wind and unfortunately the highways were strewn with cars that never made it to their final destination. Without any ambulance service, many people died on the spot. Those well enough to make it to a hospital usually had a pretty good chance of living. It was raining by now so the Hospital Administrator took me to the hospital in a van. He had two armed army men in the van as his "escorts." This taxi service to the hospital seemed a real luxury compared to driving at night in the rain on my motorbike. I was thankful for their kindness especially since I was exhausted from having so little sleep.
After repairing the patient's laceration I tried to sleep on the hide-a-bed in the hospital library. The public address system's nonstop music kept me from sleeping so I decided to walk home. One of the soldiers assigned to guard the hospital escorted me. It was an opportunity to talk to him about my real reason for being in Liberia, which was to share my relationship with Jesus Christ to Liberians.
Collapsing with fatigue on the couch cushions on the floor in Jane's living room, I fell sound asleep.
That was my first day living under the new government of a man destined to change the course of Liberian history. Over the coming days, Master Sergeant Doe and the other 16 men who overthrew the Tolbert regime established a government whose power was unlike anything Liberians had ever known.
God's guiding hand had been evident in my life many times. Often it was in retrospect that I realized His moving the pieces on the board of my life were to effect His purposes. This introduction - to the country and people of Liberia, to the medical and surgical tragedies, to the tribalism and culture, to the missionary culture and missionary experience - were foundational for events which lay ahead.