In the last years of his life Demetriescu suffered great financial difficulties. In 1949 he was employed as a piano teacher at the Art Institute in Cluj-Napoca, Romania, but his salary was insufficient to allow him to even rent a place to live, so he slept in one of the teaching halls of the institute, while his family was living a life of misery in Bucharest.
Demetriescu was also a good chess player who participated in a few international tournaments, he preferred correspondence play because it did mot interfer with his music interests.
He played board 5 on the Romanian team at the 3rd Unofficial Chess Olympiad (which was not organized by FIDE), which took place in Munich from August 17 to September 1, 1936. The Romanian team finished 14th out of 21.
Demetriescu was better in correspondence play. In the 1930s he participated in the national correspondence championships, finisjing 10th in 1934-1935 and 9th in 1936-1937 and14th in 1937-1938.
In the following game which has a nice finishing touch he defeats the Dutch master Lodewijk Prins (1913-199) who at the time was a promising junior. The game was played in a small tournament at Ebensee, today a market town in Austria. Dutch GM J.H. Donner, who had no great love for Prims, once described him as a Grandmaster who couldn’t tell a Bishop from a Knight, but Prins was the Dutch champion in 1965. 
Several years after the tournament the town became known for its concentration camp established on 1943 by the SS in order to build tunnels for armaments storage near the town. Between 8,500 and 11,000 prisoners died in the camp, most from hunger or malnutrition. Political prisoners were most common and prisoners came from many different countries. Conditions were poor, and along with the lack of food, exposure to cold weather and forced hard labor made survival difficult. US Army troops liberated the camp on May 6, 1945. Today residential homes exist on the site and a memorial cemetery is nearby. There is also a memorial tunnel and a museum nearby.
Lodewijk Prins–Theophil Demetriescu0–1B44Ebensee1933Stockfish 17
B44: Sicilian, Taimanov Variation 1.e4 e6 2.c4 c5 3.f3 c6 4.d4 cxd4 5.xd4 f6 6.c3 b4 7.db5 White plays an ultra-sharp line that is favorable
to black. Safer ware 7.Nxc3 or even 7.Qd2?! xe4 8.g4 xc3 As his mext
move shows, this is not the most accurate. 8...f6 is better and it is too
risky fpr white to take the g-Pawn. 9.xg7 g8 10.h6 g6 The Q has no
good square to which it can retreat and so black has an active position. 9.bxc3 Now black cannot afford to sacrifice the g-Pawn and this retreat is an
indication that his last move was wrong. f8 9...c5 10.xg7 f8 11.f4
Threatening 12.Nc7+ 11.xh7 a6 12.a3 xa3 13.xa3 a5 14.b1 is only
equal. 11...e5 12.e3 xe3 13.fxe3 White;s Ps are shattered, but the
threat on Ne6+ is too hard for b;ack to meet. e7 14.c5 g8 15.h6 g6 16.xh7 f8 17.d6 White is winning. 10.c5 This position has been reached a
few times in recent years and white has played 10.Ba3, but it has been shown
that 10.Qg3 keeps a slight advantage,\. a6 Well played. Oddly, at this point
black has nothing to fear from Nd6+ 11.d6+ xd6 12.cxd6 At first glance
black's position may appear badly compromised because of the white P on d6,
but he has a nove that gives him the advantage. f6 This defends the g-Pawn
and white has to take time to defend agains ...Qxc3+ 13.b2 The B is not
well placed here so 13.Qg3 defending both Ps and intending to develop the B to
a more active square was better. 0-0 Note that white has no way
of satisfactorily meeting the threat of ...Qe5+ followed by ...Qxd6 14.0-0-0 Thus turns out to be a very poor choice because it leaves his K exposed. 14.d1 b5 15.e2 b7 16.0-0 e5 The P is saved, but at the cost of giving
black an active position. Best mow appears to be 17.g3 g6 18.xg6 xg6 19.f4 h4 20.g4 f5 21.g5 d5 22.a3 fc8 Black's position should prove
decisive according to Stockfish, Dragon by Komodo and Fritz 19. 14...b5 15.d3 h6+ This is even stronger than grabbong the insignificant f-Pawn. 16.c2 f5 17.e2 b7 18.g4 Hoping to open up files leading to b;ack's K, but
the attempt will prove ineffective. ac8 Hoping for ...Nd4+. 19.b1 a5
20.hg1 fxg4 Threatens to win with ...Bf3. Again, black does not
waste time grabbing a P with ...Qxh2 21.c1 f6 aiming for ...Bf3. 22.xg4 f3 This tome grabbing a P with 22...Rxc3 woulf allow white to equalize. 22...xc3 23.b2 c4 24.h5 h6 25.xc4 f3 This complcated position is
about equal after the best move 26.xe6+ dxe6 27.g6 xg6+ 28.xg6 e4+ 29.a1 xg6 30.xc3 23.h3 g6 Effectvely ending all white's hopes on the
K-side. 24.de1 24.xg6+ is not quite sufficient, but in view of the
vertigo inducing complications that result it would have been an excellent
choice. hxg6 25.g1 xc3 26.xg6 How does black get out of thid jam? There
is only one way, but it wons. 26.xg6+ xg6 27.xg6 e4+ 28.xe4 xh3 26...xc1+ 27.xc1 f4+ 28.b1 g7 Brilliant! Discovered checks don;t save
white. 29.e4+ f6 30.xf3 xf3 31.xf3 e5 Black is winning, but how?! 32.d1 xf2 33.h1 c4 34.h4 e3 35.h5 xd1 36.xd1 h2 with a winning
R+P ending. 24...c4 25.g3 xc3 White's next move allows mate, but there
was really no way of saving the game. 26.d1 d2+ 27.xd2 xd3+ White resigned. 27...xd3+ 28.a1 d4+ 29.b1 e4+ 30.d3 xd3+ 31.xd3 xd3+ 32.a1 c2 33.c1 d4+ 34.c3 xc1+ 35.b2 xc3# 0–1
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