A Respectable Occupation: - University of Hertfordshire Research ...

assistant dispenser to dispenser. So by 1779 the employment of dispensers
who had passed an appropriate examination set by the Society of
Apothecaries was commonplace in naval hospitals. 6 Matthews supports
this, saying that assistant dispensers serving in the navy, whether ashore in
this country, or abroad, or at sea, had to have passed the Society of
Apothecaries‘ assistant‘s examination. 7
Shortly after St Petersburg was founded in 1703, Peter the Great
started to develop his navy for the Swedish Wars; part of this development
was the provision of hospitals and medical services for dockyard workers
and naval personnel. The administration of the hospitals and the medical
service was included in the Admiralty Regulations published by Peter the
Great in 1722 and these were based on similar regulations existing in
Holland, France, England and Sweden. 8
In the latter half of the eighteenth century, Russia was less developed
than England and had come to the attention of British entrepreneurs.
Catherine II, the Empress at the time, was enthusiastic about improving
the skills of her work force and it was in these circumstances that Samuel
Bentham a naval architect and brother of the reformer, Jeremy Bentham,
went to work in Russia in 1780. 9 He was struck by the opportunities that
existed for improvement in trade in many commodities and while working
on a Black Sea naval base, he was frustrated by a shortage of skilled
workmen. In consequence, he tried on a number of occasions to recruit
6
Cowen, „Notes on Hospital Pharmacy in the Royal Navy in the Eighteenth Century‟, 572.
7
Matthews, History of Pharmacy in Britain, p. 193.
8
B. Haigh, „Design for a Medical Service: Peter the Great‟s Admiralty Regulations (1722)‟, Medical
History, 19, 2, (1975) 130.
9
F. Rosen, „Bentham, Jeremy (1748-1832)‟, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (Oxford, 2004).
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