Women practising physic
This correspondence from 150 years ago, between the RCP and one of the most famous pioneers of medical education for women, Elizabeth Garrett-Anderson (1836–1917), illustrates the attitudes and barriers women faced in the 19th century in their efforts to acquire education and training in male-dominated professions.
Over the course of the 19th century the medical professions faced an increasing number of approaches from women attempting to gain entry. Women faced immense difficulties. Not only were very few universities prepared to accept female students, but there were almost no teaching hospitals prepared to allow female medical students to take courses of practical study.
Application by Elizabeth Garrett for LRCP in form of Autograph letter to the President (Sir Thomas Watson) presenting herself as candidate for the Licence, 1864
However, Elizabeth Garrett was the daughter of a wealthy London merchant and she was a very determined woman. Despite marrying in 1871 and having three children, Garrett-Anderson continued to blaze a trail for other women to follow.
Garrett was turned down by the RCP for admittance to examination for a licence in May 1864. They had consulted their solicitors and the registrar wrote ‘by the terms of its Charter, the College is precluded from admitting females to examinations for a licence to practice physic.’ It was to be almost 50 years before the RCP statutes were changed by a majority vote, in January 1909, to admit ‘females’ to examinations.
Letter from Sir Henry Pitman to Elizabeth Garrett informing her that her application had been laid before a meeting of the College, 1864
Because the charter of the Society of Apothecaries was less definite about allowing access to women than that of the RCP, Garrett threatened legal action to force them to give her access to their examinations. In 1865 she obtained the licence of the Society of Apothecaries which put her name on the medical register, the first woman qualified in Britain to do so and the only one until 1876.
In 1870 Garrett was the first woman to obtain an MD from the University of Paris, and in 1873 she was admitted to membership of the British Medical Association. The association voted against the admission of further women in 1878 and she remained the only woman member for 19 years.
Since 1909 female medical practitioners have become embedded into the RCP and many of their achievements, contributions and stories can be discovered through our archives.
Pamela Forde, archive manager