Consumer Culture, Self-Prescription, and Status: Nineteenth-Century Medicine Chests in the Royal Navy

Abstract

A comparative analysis of four nineteenth-century medicine chests from the collection of the National Maritime Museum in Greenwich, London and the lives of their owners, shows that although the nineteenth century saw a rampant growth in medicinal consumer goods, the availability of effective self-prescription drugs remained limited, even to those affluent enough to acquire a ‘personal’ medicine chest. The article shows that retail medicine chests sold by high street chemists fitted into broader socio-economic developments, such as the increased mobility of Victorian Britons and the rise of the high street and consumer culture. Moreover, the chests were personalized by their owners, and functioned simultaneously as practical objects and status symbols, distinguishing the psychology of nineteenth-century health consumers from their modern counterparts. Analysis of the contents of medicine chests gives a vivid impression of the palliatives available to nineteenth-century naval men and their families, as well...