Worshipful Society of Apothecaries of London

The Worshipful Society of Apothecaries of London, a City Livery Company, received its Charter and Grant of Arms in 1617 and acquired its Hall in 1632. Following its destruction in the Great Fire of 1666, Apothecaries' Hall was rebuilt on the same site and is the oldest extant livery company Hall in the City. London apothecaries had originally been members of the Grocers' Company until they were granted their own charter of incorporation by James I in recognition of their specialist skills in compounding and dispensing drugs.

The Society established an 'Elaboratory' for the bulk production of medicines in 1671-1672 at Apothecaries' Hall, laying the foundations of the British pharmaceutical industry. The Society's trade expanded and the Laboratory Stock, 1672, and Navy Stock, 1703, were created, merging to become the United Stock in 1822. From 1888 a committee managed the pharmaceutical businesses. The Society continued to manufacture, wholesale and retail drugs at the Hall until 1922.

In 1673 the Society founded Chelsea Physic Garden. Apprentices and later medical students were taught botany at the Garden, where the Society's ceremonial barge was kept and raw drugs and medicinal plants were grown, some of which were processed in the Hall laboratories. The Society managed the Garden until 1899.

In 1704, as a result of the ruling in the House of Lords in the Rose Case, apothecaries won the right both to prescribe and dispense medicines and so became legally ratified members of the medical profession. The Apothecaries Act, 1815, empowered the Society to institute a Court of Examiners to examine medical students and to grant its licence to practise medicine, the LSA, to successful candidates. The post-nominal was later changed to LMSSA by the Apothecaries Act, 1907, to reflect the all-round competence of Licentiates in medicine and surgery. John Keats qualified as Licentiate of the Society, 1816 and Elizabeth Garrett (later Garrett Anderson) became the first woman doctor to qualify in Britain, obtaining her Licence in 1865. Ronald Ross, the second Nobel Prizewinner in Medicine or Physiology, 1902, qualified LSA in 1881. The Society offers eleven specialist medical postgraduate diplomas, including Medical Jurisprudence, Forensic Human Identification and HIV Medicine.

In 1959 the Faculty of the History and Philosophy of Medicine and Pharmacy of the Society of Apothecaries was established, running and teaching two diploma courses and holding an annual programme of eponymous lectures at Apothecaries' Hall. In 2004 the Faculty of Conflict and Catastrophe Medicine was founded, resulting from the success of the pioneering Diploma in the Medical Care of Catastrophes.

The Society is number 58 in the city livery companies' order of precedence, is the largest company and the only one designated 'Society'. By its constitution 85 percent of its membership must belong to the medical profession.