Aleksander Kakowski

Who was Aleksander Kakowski?

Aleksander Kakowski was a Polish politician and member of the Regency Council, and as Cardinal Archbishop of Warsaw was the last titular Primate of the Kingdom of Poland, before Poland regained its independence in 1918.

Aleksander Kakowski was born February 5, 1862, in Dębiny near Przasnysz, the son of Francis Kakowski and Paulina Dolega-Ossowski. He was ordained a priest on May 30, 1886, in Warsaw, by Cardinal Wincenty Chościak-Popiel. The following year he became one of the professors at the Warsaw Theological Seminary. In 1910 he became Rector of the Saint Petersburg Roman Catholic Theological Academy and on July 22, 1913, he was ordained a bishop by Stanisław Zdzitowiecki. On September 14, 1913, he became the archbishop of Warsaw in St. John's Cathedral, thus becoming the titular primate of the Kingdom of Poland.

After the outbreak of the Great War he remained in Warsaw and in 1917 Kakowski was appointed to be a member of the Regency Council, a semi-independent and temporary highest authority of the Kingdom of Poland, recreated by the Central Powers as part of their Mitteleuropa plan. Kakowski was one of three members of that body, which served as a provisional head of state.