Pharmaceutical  Service  in 
f  Am.  Jour.  Pharm. 
<•   November,  191 7. 
"  Organisation  et  F one tionne merit  du  Service  Pharmaceutique 
de  L'Armee  "  by  Leon  Varenne,  Docteur  en  Pharmacie — Pharmacien 
Major  de  L'Armee.  Preface  by  De  M.  le  Prof  ess  eur  P.  Caseneuve 
Senateur  du  Rhone. 
The  history  of  the  French  military  pharmacists  can  be  traced 
back  to  the  time  of  Richelieu.  In  1630,  the  regulations  of  the  prin- 
cipal army  hospitals  defined  the  personnel  of  the  hospital  staff  and 
the  duties  of  the  physician,  surgeon  and  pharmacist. 
The  law  of  December  20,  171 8,  instituted  officially  the  sanitary 
service  and  regulated  precisely  for  the  first  time  the  duties  of  the 
hospital  corps.  The  regulations  of  January  1,  1747,  made  provision 
for  the  formulas  of  the  pharmacopoeia  of  the  Royal  military  hos- 
pitals with  a  list  of  drugs  to  be  included  in  their  supplies  and  fur- 
ther provided  for  commissions  for  the  officers  to  be  issued  by  the 
Secretary  of  War. 
The  acts  of  1774,  1775  and  1777  further  organized  the  sanitary 
service  in  the  districts  of  Strasburg,  Metz  and  Lille,  with  the  grades 
of  professors  of  medicine,  surgeon-major  and  apothecary-major,  the 
commissions  for  the  officers  of  the  Sanitary  Council  being  respec- 
tively physician-inspector,  surgeon-inspector  and  apothecary-major. 
Even  at  that  early  date  the  apothecary-major  was  charged  with  the 
duties  of  analyzing  the  remedies  and  providing  all  medicines. 
In  1788,  important  modifications  were  made  in  the  organization 
of  the  sanitary  service.  A  sanitary  council  was  formed  consisting 
of  six  superior  officers  of  the  sanitary  service ;  two  physicians,  two 
surgeons  and  two  pharmacists  (Bayen  and  Parmentier).  At  the 
same  time,  the  number  of  the  military  hospitals  was  increased,  the 
service  in  the  regimental  infirmaries  extended  and  necessarily  the 
duties  of  the  physicians  and  pharmacists  considerably  augmented. 
It  is  admitted  that,  at  this  period,  medical  influence  was  in  the 
ascendency  and,  owing  to  the  excessive  reduction  in  the  number  of 
pharmacists  and  duties  that  did  not  bring  them  in  such  close  con- 
tact with  the  army,  pharmacy  was  subordinated  to  medicine.  It 
was  the  laboratory  of  Bayen,  from  which  came,  in  1765,  the  memo- 
rable analyses  of  the  springs  of  Bagneres  de  Luchon  and,  in  1774, 
the  essay  on  experiments  with  the  mercurial  precipitates,  that  over- 
threw the  doctrine  of  Stahl  and  started  chemistry  along  new  lines, 
that  prepared  the  way  for  the  emancipation  of  pharmacy.  Subse- 
quently Medical  Inspector  Begin,  in  his  "  Studies  of  the  Military 
Sanitary  Service,"  declared  "  that  the  sciences  of  medicine  and 
