He was born in Frâua (called Axente Sever since 1931), the son of Iacob Baciu and Ana, née Maxim.

[4][2] Named prefect of the Blaj district, he became commander of Legion I Blasensis, which he turned into the strongest military unit[2] in the army of Avram Iancu.

From October 1848 to August 1849, with the objective of disarming Hungarian units, he saw action at Uioara, Ciumbrud, Sâncrai, Cricău, Aiud, Turda, Cluj, Cetatea de Baltă, Ocna Sibiului, the Apuseni Mountains, Alba Iulia and elsewhere.

Together with other commanders (chiefly, Iancu and Simion Balint [ro]), he wrote reports on these events (published in German in newspapers from Vienna in 1850–1853), in which he argued that the Romanians in Transylvania were loyal to the Habsburg Emperor, and that they fought with Hungarian troops because the government in Budapest did not recognize the rights of the Romanians as a nation.

[2] There are streets named after him in Aiud, Cluj-Napoca, Mediaș, Satu Mare, Sibiu, Sighișoara, and Turda, as well as a plaza in Timișoara.