A monument of the "opulchentsi" - the Bulgarian volunteer units who fought with the Russian Army against Ottoman Turkey in the Liberation War of 1877-78 - was opened in downtown Sofia 131 years after the fiercest battles at the Shipka Pass.

The monument is located behind the Military Club, and is a seven-meter high copy of the figure of the standard-bearer from the famous painting of Jaroslav Vesin "The Samara Flag" (1911).

The base of the monument is in the shape of a military cross, and has four bas-reliefs - one on each side.

Three of the bas-relief represent the famous paintings "The Battle for Eagle's Nest Peak", "The Consecration of the Samara Flag", and "The Climbing of the Balkan Mounts", whereas the fourth one on the back of the monument is a map of the route of the Bulgarian volunteer units during the war.

Twelve artillery cartridge cases with the names of the thousands of Bulgarian volunteer fighters are built into the monument. They contain soil from the places of their most decisive battles during the Russo-Turkish War of 1877-78.

The ceremony for the opening of the monument was attended by hundreds of Sofia residents, as well as by the Bulgarian President Georgi Parvanov, the Sofia Mayor Boyko Borisov, the Defense Minister Nikolay Tsonev, the Head of the General Staff of the Bulgarian Army General Zlatan Stoykov, and the Director of the National History Museum Bozhidar Dimitrov.

The Samara Flag was made by nuns in the city of Samara in the Russian Empire (today Moldova's capital Kishinev), and was presented to the Bulgarian volunteer units.

The author of the 1911 painting "The Samara Flag" is the Czech artist Jaroslav Vesin (1860-1915), who lived in Bulgaria in 1897-1915.

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