Petre Ion Gheorghe was a Bulgarian-born Romanian communist and anti-fascist resistance member, executed by Romania for espionage and treason.
22 Facts About Petre Gheorghe
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Petre Gheorghe took part in the political infighting that split the party, and involved himself in the anti-fascist resistance before being arrested, tried, and executed.
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Petre Ion Gheorghe was born in Dobrich, Southern Dobruja, to a poor family of Bulgarian peasants who practiced Bulgarian Orthodoxy.
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Petre Gheorghe's father, Ivan Georgiev, was a blacksmith and his mother, Ivanova Kaluda, was a homemaker.
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Petre Gheorghe had two other brothers, Sebe Ivanof and Ion, as well as a sister, Ivanka.
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Petre Gheorghe's parents enrolled him in the local high school lacking financial means, Petre had to renounce his studies.
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Petre Gheorghe was hired as a carpenter apprentice, but gave up following the death of his father, and began work at a local construction company.
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Petre Gheorghe learned about communism by reading, as a teenager, the classics of Marxism.
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Petre Gheorghe was one of the protest leaders in Bazargic, and found himself detained by police.
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Later that year, Petre Gheorghe crossed into the Soviet Union as a delegate to the 5th Congress of the PCdR in Moscow.
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Petre Gheorghe was convicted to 15 days in jail for spreading communist propaganda.
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Petre Gheorghe was court-martialed and convicted to 3 months in prison, 5 years loss of civil rights, and a 500-lei fine.
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Petre Gheorghe was freed on April 24,1935, after having served his time in Caliacra Penitentiary.
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Petre Gheorghe then settled in Bucharest, where he was named Secretary of the Central Committee of the Union of Communist Youth.
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Petre Gheorghe wrote a letter to the leadership of the party, whereby he voiced his displeasure.
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Petre Gheorghe was again conscripted and spent the year 1939 in a military unit in Galati, but returned in 1940 to lead the PCdR regional committee in Dobruja.
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Still working underground as a secretary of the Bucharest party bureau, Petre Gheorghe sided with Gheorghiu-Dej and Emil Bodnaras, maneuvering against the General Secretary, Stefan Foris.
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Petre Gheorghe was himself arrested by 1942, after Romania entered World War II as a Nazi ally.
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Petre Gheorghe was scheduled to be executed on February 8,1943.
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Petre Gheorghe was then blindfolded and shot by an execution squad.
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Petre Gheorghe staged a party coup, kidnapping Foris and other members of the 1940 Secretariat.
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Petre Gheorghe's remains were moved in 1967 in the mausoleum in Carol Park, together with the remains of other "revolutionary fighters".