Doctor Alexandru Bireescu, one of the martyrs who sacrificed himself for faith and nation

Doctor Alexandru Bireescu was born into the family of a well-known priest from Banat, appreciated for his contribution to the national movement of the Romanians until the Great Unification of 1 December 1918. His parents, Coriolan and Ofelia[1], were wealthy, pious people who practised Christian morality. They brought up their children to believe in God and to respect truth and justice. Alexandru Bireescu attended primary and secondary school in Lugoj. He was an intellectually gifted young man, passionate about study and education.

Between 1910 and 1914, he attended the Faculty of Medicine at the Universities of Budapest and Vienna, where he received an excellent professional training, which he used with dedication for the good and health of the people. He did his military service in the 94th Infantry Regiment of Lugoj, contingent of 1914, obtaining the rank of Captain in the Reserve[2]. At the end of the First World War, he settled in Lugoj and opened his own private medical practice[3]. Through hard work and competence, he became a renowned doctor, a highly esteemed specialist with a calling. He married the young Eugenia, but they had no children. He also acquired a very good material situation, owning two houses in Lugoj, 3 hectares of arable land and 80 hectares of forest. With the establishment of the communist regime, he was declared a landlord, his two houses were nationalised and the agricultural land was expropriated[4].

His material situation, his social status and the quality of his work naturally placed him among the leading personalities of inter-war Lugoj. Added to this were his exemplary moral behaviour and the respect he showed for the city’s inhabitants, and above all his full, convincing and sincere attachment to the Church of his ancestors and the values of the Christian faith. He was a tireless moral and material supporter of the Christian Church, a faithful follower and practitioner of its teachings. His faith in God and his respect for the values of Christian morality guided his work and his dealings with people. The high esteem he enjoyed in the community of Lugoj was also due to this Christian moral behaviour.

As mayor of this town in Banat, he always endeavoured to support the Church by being civil in his dealings with the locals, a fact appreciated by the officials of inter-war Romania, who in 1934 awarded him the Order of the Romanian Crown with the rank of Knight[5].

The Soviet military occupation of Romania and the imposition of the Communist regime radically changed the life of Alexandru Bireescu, a man known for his firm support of human moral values. He was not intimidated by the threats and constant surveillance of people in the Communist Party. He took an active part in the election campaign in the autumn of 1946, supporting the National Liberal Party[6]. After 1947 the repression against him intensified. The expropriation of his land followed, then the nationalisation of his houses. Materially, he was dealt a decisive blow. On 15 April 1952, he was arrested by the Securitate on the pretext that he was a member of the anti-communist conspiracy organisation “National Liberation Committee”, which was preparing to overthrow the communist regime in Romania[7]. He was investigated by the Securitate police in Lugoj and Timisoara until January 1953, when he was transferred to Timișoara prison.

During the brutal investigation, he strongly denied the accusations made by the investigators. He admits that he was offered a position in the organisation, but that he refused because he was an old man who could no longer take on such responsibility. He admits that he was aware of the existence of the organisation but did not denounce it. As a good Christian, he did not want to cause suffering to people whom he had warned of the consequences[8]. The investigators were forced to accept that he was not directly involved in the organisation. However, they accused him of “failure to denounce and conspiracy against the social order”. He was accused of “counter-revolutionary activity and support for the liberal movement” after 23 August 1944[9].

During the long and arduous investigations by the Securitate, he fell ill with migratory pneumonia, then pulmonary oedema, generalised arteriosclerosis and myocardial syndrome. A brief medical file in the Military Court Archives shows a very poor state of health and general physical deterioration. His illness worsened in July 1952, but he was not admitted for medical treatment until 18 January 1953[10]. One month later, on 17 February 1953, he died. The attitude and direct action of the Securitate organs were deliberate and aimed at the physical extermination of the doctor and patriot Alexandru Bireescu. Until his death, he remained faithful to the religious and moral convictions that had guided him throughout his life. Despite his serious illness, he stubbornly refused to participate in the Securitate plans to extend repressive measures to other innocent people. His moral conduct and the firmness with which he protected his fellow citizens rightly place Alexandru Bireescu among the martyrs who sacrificed themselves for the faith and nation and for the Romanian Orthodox Church, to which he belonged.

(Ioan Munteanu – Martyrs for Christ in Romania during the Communist Regime, E.I.B.M.B.O.R., Bucharest, 2007, pp. 90-92)

[1] ATMTT, Criminal fond, file 1154/53/Timiș, vol. 1, f. 146.

[2] Ibid.

[3] Ibid, f. 126.

[4] Ibid, pp. 124-125.

[5] Ibid, p. 126.

[6] Ibid, p. 137.

[7] Ibid, p. 127.

[8] Ibid, pp. 126-136.

[9] Ibid, p. 137.

[10] Ibid.