Veteran of the Bessarabian national movement who, as foreign minister of the Moldavian Democratic Republic, championed union with Romania
Born in Răzeni, Bessarabia, in 1876, he graduated from the Chișinău seminary in 1898 and in law from the University of Dorpat in 1903. Arrested as a student for founding an association of Bessarabian students, he later worked as a deputy judge in Bălți and created the town’s first national group. He joined the National Moldavian Party in 1917 and initially won a majority for president of Sfatul Țării, but the post went to Inculeț. As foreign minister in the Erhan and Ciugureanu cabinets in 1917–1918 he sought military aid from Shcherbachev in Iași and campaigned for union. He then served as Minister of Justice under Vaida-Voevod, worked in Paris, London and Geneva for recognition of the union and sat in parliament for the National Party and the National Peasants’ Party. Arrested by the communist authorities in 1950, he died in Sighet Prison in 1954.
Career timeline
- 1903Law degree, University of Dorpat
- 1917–1918Director General for Foreign Affairs of the Moldavian Democratic Republic
- 1919–1920Romanian Minister of Justice (Vaida-Voevod cabinet)
- 1927–1936Head of the Bessarabian branch of ASTRA
- 1950–1954Imprisoned in Sighet Prison
The Conducător who took Romania into the Axis war against the Soviet Union and ordered the killings in Transnistria, executed at Jilava in 1946
On the afternoon of 23 August 1944, summoned to the palace, Antonescu refused the king's demand for an immediate armistice; Michael gave the prearranged signal and the guards arrested him. That night the king's radio address announced the armistice, and the Romanian army turned its guns on the Germans.
A cavalry officer born into a military family in Pitești, he helped plan the defence of Mărășești as a staff officer in the First World War, served as military attaché in Paris and London and was chief of the general staff in 1933–34. Defence minister in the Goga government of 1937–38, he fell out with Carol II and was confined to the Bistrița monastery in 1940. When the loss of Bessarabia and Northern Transylvania in the summer of 1940 shook the monarchy, he became prime minister with full powers on 4 September, forced Carol II to abdicate two days later and styled himself Conducător, founding the National Legionary State with the Iron Guard before crushing the Legionary rebellion by force in January 1941. He joined the Tripartite Pact in November 1940 and invaded the Soviet Union alongside Germany in June 1941, recovering Bessarabia and Northern Bukovina and occupying Transnistria beyond the Dniester. Through the Iași pogrom, the Odessa massacre and the deportations to Transnistria, between 280,000 and 380,000 Jews and more than 10,000 Roma died under Romanian jurisdiction, the Wiesel Commission concluded in 2004. After losing two armies at Stalingrad he sought a way out of the war, but on 23 August 1944 King Michael had him arrested and handed to the Soviets; sentenced to death by the Bucharest People's Tribunal in May 1946, he was shot at Jilava on 1 June.
Career timeline
- 1916–1918Staff officer in the First World War
- 1933–1934Chief of the General Staff
- 1937–1938Minister of Defence
- 1940Prime minister with full powers; Carol II deposed; title of Conducător
- 1940–1941National Legionary State; Legionary rebellion crushed
- 1941Invasion of the Soviet Union; occupation of Transnistria
- 1944Arrested on 23 August; handed to the Soviets
- 1946Sentenced to death by the People's Tribunal; executed at Jilava
Romania's commander on the Eastern Front
Before the flank northwest of Stalingrad collapsed, Dumitrescu requested German reinforcements.
Petre Dumitrescu was a career officer of the Kingdom of Romania who commanded the Romanian Third Army on the Eastern Front during the Second World War. Alongside German forces, he led Romanian operations in Bukovina, Ukraine, Crimea, and the Caucasus as Romania pursued the war against the Soviet Union. In November 1942, the Third Army's exposed flank northwest of Stalingrad came under the Soviet Uranus offensive; Dumitrescu requested support, but his formation suffered catastrophic losses and retreated. Charged with war crimes after the war, he was acquitted in 1946 for lack of sufficient evidence.
Career timeline
- 1901–1903Studied at the School of Artillery and Engineers; commissioned as a second lieutenant
- 1911–1913Studied at the Superior War School
- 1930–1932Military attaché to France
- 1935–1937Vice Chief of the General Staff
- 1940–1941Commander of the Romanian First Army
- 1941–1944Commander of the Romanian Third Army
- 1942Commanded the Third Army during the Battle of Stalingrad
- 1944Retired and investigated for alleged war crimes
Journalist and politician who, as vice-president and later president of Sfatul Țării, led the movement for Bessarabia’s union with Romania
Born to poor peasants in Cubolta, Bessarabia, in 1883, he graduated from the Chișinău seminary and entered the University of Yuryev, but as a Socialist Revolutionary had to quit after the 1905 revolution. Sought by the Tsarist authorities after printing the hymn “Deșteaptă-te, române!”, he took refuge in Iași and studied there in 1908–1912. From 1913 he published the newspaper Cuvânt moldovenesc in Chișinău, writing unceasingly for union, and in 1917 he founded the Moldovan National Party. He was elected first vice-president, then president of Sfatul Țării. After 1918 he served as minister for Bessarabia and in other posts and joined the National Peasants’ Party; in 1924 he accused the Romanian government of turning Bessarabia into an “inferno”. Arrested in 1950, he was sentenced in the Soviet Union to 25 years’ hard labour, was held until 1957 and died in 1979.
Career timeline
- 1908–1912Studies at the Faculty of Letters and Philosophy, University of Iași
- 1913Launches the newspaper Cuvânt moldovenesc
- 1917Founds the Moldovan National Party
- 1917–1918Vice-president, then president of Sfatul Țării
- 1919–1920Romanian Minister and Secretary of State for Bessarabia
- 1927Romanian Minister of Public Works
- 1950–1957Arrest and imprisonment (Sighet, Soviet hard labour, Aiud)
Bessarabian politician who presided over Sfatul Țării and the Moldavian Democratic Republic and saw through its union with Romania
Born to a peasant family in Răzeni, Bessarabia, in 1884, he graduated from the Chișinău seminary and Saint Petersburg University and worked as a physicist at the Meteorological Observatory. After the February Revolution he joined the Socialist Revolutionary Party and sat in the Petrograd Soviet, and Kerensky sent him to Bessarabia as the Provisional Government’s representative. At first he said Bessarabia should remain part of Russia, but as president of Sfatul Țării and of the Moldavian Democratic Republic he steered the vote for union with Romania in April 1918. After the union he became Minister of State for Bessarabia; in 1923 he took his wing of the Bessarabian Peasants’ Party into the National Liberal Party, and he later served as minister of health, of the interior and of communications and as vice-president of the Council of Ministers. He died of a heart attack in 1940.
Career timeline
- 1915Physicist at the Meteorological Observatory, Saint Petersburg
- 1917Member of the Petrograd Soviet (Socialist Revolutionary Party)
- 1917Assistant Government Commissioner of Bessarabia
- 1917–1918President of Sfatul Țării and of the Moldavian Democratic Republic
- 1918–1920Romanian Minister of State for Bessarabia
- 1927–1928Romanian Minister of Health and Social Protection
- 1933Romanian Minister of the Interior (Duca cabinet)
- 1936Vice-President of the Romanian Council of Ministers
Bessarabian Socialist Revolutionary who headed the first government of the Moldavian Democratic Republic and put land reform first
Born in Tănătari, Bessarabia, in 1884, he graduated from the Chișinău seminary and the Faculty of Letters in Saint Petersburg and taught. A Socialist Revolutionary, he returned to Bessarabia in 1917 with Inculeț at Kerensky’s urging and was elected chairman of the governorate peasants’ soviet and to the Russian Constituent Assembly. In December 1917 he became President of the Council of Directors General, the Moldavian Democratic Republic’s first government, and Director General for Agriculture, putting land reform first. His view that the republic should bear the majority people’s name prevailed; he put the entry of Romanian troops to a vote, yet protested their presence, fearing they would be used to block land reform. He voted for union but resigned amid charges of a pro-Russian stance, and later sat in the Romanian Senate. He fled to Bucharest in 1940 and died there in 1971.
Career timeline
- 1917Chairman of the Bessarabian Governorate Soviet of Peasants’ Deputies
- 1917Member of the Russian Constituent Assembly
- 1917–1918President of the Council of Directors General and Director General for Agriculture
- 1918Director General of Education in Bessarabia
The last King of Romania, who arrested Antonescu on 23 August 1944 to bring the country over to the Allies and abdicated at gunpoint in 1947
On the morning of 30 December 1947, in a palace surrounded by troops, Groza and Gheorghiu-Dej put the abdication before him. Michael testified in exile that he was told refusal would mean bloodshed and the shooting of a thousand students held in custody. That afternoon parliament proclaimed the People's Republic.
Born to Crown Prince Carol of the House of Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen and Helen of Greece, he became king at six in 1927 under a regency because his father had renounced the succession, and was demoted to crown prince when Carol II returned to take the throne in 1930. When Antonescu deposed Carol II in September 1940 he was crowned again at eighteen, but power lay with Antonescu's dictatorship and the Axis alliance. On 23 August 1944, with the Red Army across the border, he arrested Antonescu in a palace coup, concluded an armistice with the Allies and turned Romania against Germany, becoming one of the very few foreigners awarded the Soviet Order of Victory. Yet in March 1945 he had to appoint the Groza government under Vyshinsky's pressure, and his "royal strike" of refusing to sign decrees from August that year could not stop the rigged election of 1946 or the Maniu trial of 1947. On 30 December 1947 he signed the abdication forced on him by Groza and Gheorghiu-Dej, and the People's Republic was proclaimed the same day. Stripped of citizenship in 1948, he lived in Britain and Switzerland as a test pilot and a broker; a million people gathered in Bucharest on his first return at Easter 1992. His citizenship was restored in 1997, and he died in Switzerland in 2017, buried with a state funeral in the royal necropolis at Curtea de Argeș.
Career timeline
- 1927–1930First reign under a regency
- 1930–1940Crown prince
- 1940Crowned again after Antonescu deposed Carol II
- 1944Palace coup of 23 August; Antonescu arrested, Romania joins the Allies
- 1945Awarded the Soviet Order of Victory; forced to appoint the Groza government
- 1945–1946"Royal strike", refusing to sign decrees
- 1947Forced abdication on 30 December; exile
- 1948Stripped of citizenship
- 1992First return visit to Romania
- 1997Citizenship restored
