Lectures, which had been carried on at the professors’ houses, were begun in 1808, at a building on the corner of Fayette (Chatham) street and McClellan’s alley, and the first class, consisting of five, received its degrees in 1810.  As the school grew and nourished, the ideas of its founders become more extensive and, in 1812, a long act was passed,[14] authorizing “the college for the promotion of medical knowledge” “to constitute, appoint, and annex to itself the other three colleges or faculties, viz.:  The Faculty of Divinity, the Faculty of Law, and the Faculty of the Arts and Sciences; and that the four faculties or colleges thus united, shall be and they are hereby constituted an university, by the name and under the title of the University of Maryland.”  The connection with the Medical and Chirurgical Faculty was severed and the members of the four faculties, under the name of the Regents of the University of Maryland, were to have full powers over the University and be permitted to hold property not exceeding $100,000 in yearly value.

Each faculty was allowed to appoint its own professors and lecturers, to choose a dean, and to exercise such powers as the regents shall delegate.  The Faculty of Physic was to be composed of the professors in the Medical College; that of Theology, of the professor of Theology and any “six ordained ministers of any religious society or denomination;” that of Law, of the professor of Law, “together with six qualified members of the bar;” that of the Arts and Sciences, of the professors in that department, “together with three of the principals of any three academies or Colleges of the State.”  Such a strangely formed and loosely united body could not succeed, as a more homogeneous and closely compacted one would have done.

The university was founded “on the most liberal plan, for the benefit of students of every country and every religious denomination, who shall be freely admitted to equal privileges and advantages of education, and to all the honors of the university, according to their merit, without requiring or enforcing any religious or civil test, urging their attendance upon any particular plan of religious worship or service.”  With these broad powers and provisions,[15] “the Faculty of Phisick, late of the College of Medicine of Maryland, *** convened and, by the authority vested in it by said charter and with the advice and recommendations of learned men of the several professions of Divinity, Law, and the Arts and Sciences, proceeded to annex to itself the other three faculties.”  On April 22, 1813, the Hon. Robert Smith, formerly United States Secretary of State, was chosen the first provost, and the organization of the regents was completed.[16] A lottery of $30,000 was granted the University in 1814, and another of $100,000 in 1817.[17] From the proceeds of these lotteries and other sources was built the building of the medical department on the corner of Lombard and Greene streets.  It was modelled