Ευριπίδης Μπακιρτζης

He was born in Serres on January 16, 1895 and died in Fournous, Ikaria on May 9, 1947. Evripidis Bakirtzis is by far less known by the locals and a rather ambiguous figure whose life seems to follow the fate of Greece at the time. The work of Aristotelis Spiridopoulos offers invaluable insight to his life story. His father worked at the Greek Consulate in Serres and his mother – a teacher – descended from a family with a long military history reaching back to the Greek Revolution of 1821. Bakirtzis had a sister and two brothers from his father’s previous marriage. His elder brother joined Makedonikos Agonas in March 1905 using the nickname “Nikos o Serreos” and served under several chieftains including Kapetan Mitrousis Gogolakis. As for his second brother, it is only known that he was murdered in Serres by the Bulgarian Army possibly in 1916. He was accepted in the Military Academy (Σχολή Ευελπίδων) on November 14, 1911 where he was a classmate of Sofoklis Venizelos (the son of Prime Minister Eleftherios Venizelos) with whom they became close friends. His studies were interrupted twice to take active part in the First Balkan War (against the Ottomans) and the Second Balkan War (against the Bulgarians). The break of WWI (August 1914) finds him stationed in Frourio, Kavala. The country is torn between those who support Eleftherios Venizelos and those who support King Konstantinos. Venizelos believes that the interests of the country would be better served if Greece joined the Entente Cordiale which later became the Triple Entente (an alliance between the U.K., France and Russia against Germany). King Konstantinos purports that it would be best if Greece remains neutral. Bakirtzis, some would argue out of personal interest, sides with Venizelos. Bakirtzis is distinguished in battles of WWI, notably that of Skra Di Lingen in Kilkis. In 1919, he leaves for France on a scholarship at the Supreme French School of War (Ανώτατη Γαλλική Σχολή Πολέμου). He is promoted to major (Ταγματάρχης) after five years of military service and is awarded four medals. Upon his return from France he takes part in the Greek Army’s campaign to Asia Minor where he doesn’t take part in any significant battles. In the summer of 1922 his men are forced to retreat and Bakirtzis escapes to Chios Island. Subsequently, he takes active part in Plastiras’s revolutionary Committee that later overturned King Konstantinos I. In 1926, the Tzavelas-Bakirtzis movement attempts to overthrow Theodoros Pangalos who has come to power by coup. The movement is actually guided by Plastiras who favors Venizelos (just as Bakisrtzis). Bakirtzis is arrested and sentenced to death but the sentence is not carried out. He returns to the army in 1928 as never having been sent off and is later stationed in Sofia, Bulgaria. On March 1, 1935 Bakirtzis takes part in yet another Venizelos friendly ‘movement’ to take over power. He escapes abroad and is again sentenced to death but is pardoned later on. In an article published in the newspaper ‘Anexartitos’ on July 3 1936, Evripidis Bakirtzis attacks Plastiras (who was urging people to a new coup under his command). In it Bakirtzis called Plastiras (his former friend) a fascist and purports that all coups are a result of class struggles of the oppressed people that come about when the time is right and cannot be imposed by individual ambitions. It seems that Bakirtzis’s ideology has changed drastically. After the coup of Ioannis Metaxas, Bakirtzis is arrested and sent off to Agios Efstratios and later in 1937 to Antikithira. With false accusations he is degraded to soldier and discharged as a communist and a spy for the Bulgarians. That same year although he intends to go to the Soviet Union, he ends up in Bucharest, Romania. When WWII breaks out Bakirtzis returns to Thessaloniki and asks to fight in the war as a soldier but is denied. Shortly before Athens falls in the hands of the Germans he and some of his friends are contacted in Athens by British officers to form a spy group that would provide information in the Middle East and conduct sabotage against the Germans. The name of the group is “Promitheus” and Bakirtzis’s code names “Promitheus I” and the number “333”. His active engagement in this group does not last long. Bakirtzis quickly joins the AAA (Αγών-Ανόρθωσις-Απελευθέρωσις / Fight - Rising Up - Liberation) organization. Its aim is to prevent the restoration of King George to power after the liberation, an admittedly not very popular organization. He is also involved in the creation of the “Democratic Socialist Organization” that has a Russian orientation but from which the Greek Communist Party keeps a clear distance. He also joins EAM (Greek Liberation Front) and ELAS (Greek Liberation Army, the military branch of EAM), the main movement of the Greek Resistance during the Axis occupation of Greece in WWII, mostly supported by the Communist Party of Greece and other leftish or republican groups. Bakirtzis is temporarily appointed president (prime minister) of the Political Committee for national Liberation (ΠΕΕΑ - Πολιτική Επιτροπή Εθνικής Απελευθέρωσης) which is formed on March 10, 1944 mainly but not solely by communists. Its aim is to organise the administration of occupied Greece. It is also called “government of the mountain” and is in fact one of the three governments of Greece at the time. On April 18 he offers his place to Alexandros Svolos and Bakirtzis takes over as vice president until the dissolution of the committee on September 2, 1944. In September 1946, during the civil Greek War, Bakirtzis is arrested as a leftist and is exiled to Agios Kirikas, Ikaria and later to Fournous, Ikaria. In February 1947 the Greek government allows him to testify to a UN committee that is investigating the civil war in Greece. On May 9, 1947 he is found dead with a bullet in his heart. His death was officially registered as a suicide. Aristotelis Spiridopoulos in his paper on Bakirtzis quickly dismisses the possibility of a suicide and suggests that neither the British nor the American Intelligence Agency had anything to benefit from his death. Rather he insinuates that the only substantial motives lie within the Greek Communist Party due to Bakirtzis’s disagreement with the Party’s tactical moves, his stature among leftist followers and his potential aspirations. Bakirtzis was also known as the “red colonel” for publishing articles in ‘Rizospastis’ (a leftist newspaper still in circulation) under that nickname. This bust was put in place in October 2010 and arguably bears little resemblance to the man.