THE APOTHECARIES' Act, 1815: A REINTERPRETATION

Abstract

THE story of the passing of the Apothecaries' Act is an essential prelude to an assessment of the significance of that statute.The agitation for an act to regulate medical practice in the United Kingdom, and in particular to control the practice of apothecaries throughout England and Wales, began as early as 1793.From that time until 12 July 1815, when the Apothecaries' Act received the Royal Assent, many reforms were advocated, several bills drafted, numerous petitions and counter- petitions presented, and innumerable amendments introduced.At last a bill, prepared by the Society of Apothecaries, under the patronage of the College of Physicians, was submitted for consideration by the Legislature.After much revision, the bill was finally rushed through a depleted House of Commons in the closing phases of a particularly active session.2It has been, and still is, the considered opinion of many scholars that this Act marks the beginning ofthe process of medical reform in England.This article examines in detail both the origins and the consequences of the Apothecaries' Act and suggests that existing interpretations need to be drastically revised.3By the mid-eighteenth century the apothecary had assumed the functions of a general practitioner of medicine.Some apothecaries still continued to confine their activities to dispensing, while others devoted themselves to wholesale trade, or took up botany and chemistry.'But the majority of town apothecaries and practically all those in the country attended patients of the poor and lower middle-class, prescribing and supplying medicines to them.As one pamphleteer wrote in 1773, Let the case be what it may, Apothecaries have got physic principally into their own hands: this is evidently the case, especially in the country, where the Physician seldom visits any but such as are in opulent circumstances; the poor, alas, scarce ever!It is much the same in London (allowance being made for those that are in hospitals); so that Apothecaries have by far the greatest number of patients under their own care., 1 I am indebted to Professor A. J. Taylor and Mr. I. M. Varcoe for their criticism and advice.2 The 1815 Act was passed by a majority of one on the last day of the Session, Report from the Select Committee on Public Petitions, 1833, Appendix 296, p. 251.3 The following abbreviations are used throughout this article:

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