Dissolution of the I.M.S.

Our service dissolves on the 14th of August, 1947, and I send you this letter of retrospect and farewell. Our history as a service dates back to 1612 when on the formation of the East India Company into a jointstock business, John Woodall was appointed the first Surgeon-General of the Company. He held this office for nearly thirty years and for many years was the only Surgeon-General of the Company. Until 1763, when the surgeons employed by the East India Company were combined into a regular establishment, with fixed grades for promotion, medical officers were recruited more or less on individual contracts. Though occasionally involved in the desultory fighting which took place from time to time, they were essentially civilians and engaged in purely civil duties. From 1745 onwards, however, the Company's wars in various parts of India necessitated the formation and maintenance of regular bodies of troops and in consequence the employment of military surgeons. In 1766, therefore, little more than two years after its first formal constitution, the Medical Service in India was divided into two branches, military and civil. It was combined into