FELINSKI, Zygmunt Felix. - Archbishop of Warsaw, b. Oct. 6, 1822 at Wojatyn (Volhynia), d. 1905 at Cracow. In 1851 he entered the Seminary of Zitomir, whence he passed to the Ecclesiastical Academy of St. Petersburg. Ordained priest in 1855, he became vicar of the church of St. Catherine in the tsarist capital.
He won the trust and esteem of all Catholics residing there, and Pius IX, acceding also to the desire of the Russian government, preconized him in 1862 Archbishop of Warsaw. F. soon found himself in a difficult position, for the Poles regarded him as a creature of the Russian government, while the Russians did not at all welcome his open opposition to any measure that in any way infringed the rights of Catholics. On the other hand, the archbishop was sincerely attached to his own country, and during the revolutionary disturbances of 1863 he addressed a letter to Emperor Alexander II in which he clearly expressed the necessity of granting Poland independence, albeit in the form of a personal union with Russia. After this the tsarist government ordered him to leave the diocese immediately.
Forced to leave Warsaw on June 14, 1863, he was first taken to Grodno, then exiled to Jaroslav, where he remained for a full twenty years. The Pope’s protests were in vain. Only after the agreements of Dec. 24, 1882 between the Holy See and Russia was the archbishop able to leave his exile, though he had to renounce his diocese. Preconized on Mar. 15, 1883 by Leo XIII as titular Archbishop of Tarsus, he went first to Czernowitz, and then to Cracow. He left memoirs (Pamietniki, 2 vols., Cracow 1867).