The landlord of the Old Bell Inn, still in the glory of the coaching and posting days, apparently treated for the wooden building, containing the two houses occupied one by Captain Woodriff the agent and the other by the steward and another officer, the rental of Captain Woodriff’s house to be £12 and that adjoining £10; but even at that rent he did not close. In January 1803 the whole was let to Mr. Henderson, on condition that he lived on the premises, the barrack master keeping one key of the great gate. Mr. Henderson paid an extra sum of £10 for Captain Woodriff’s house, which he probably wished to fit up either for his own residence or for the man whom he proposed to leave in charge when he was in London attending to another business which he had there; he also agreed to level the huts, which are not represented on any of the plans, and to sow the ground covered by them with grass seeds. His tenancy lasted only six months. Hostilities recommenced in May 1803, and on 3rd July Henderson had to hand over everything to two clerks appointed by the Admiralty. He pleaded that he had ploughed and sown crops, and claimed £30 18_s._ compensation; he received £18 13_s._ On the whole the Government would probably have saved money if they had locked the gates when Captain Woodriff, their agent, left the empty depot in June 1802, kept the keys themselves, and unlocked them on the 3rd July 1803. Between those dates much had taken place to affect the history of the Depot. The complete supremacy of the British Fleet, the blow given to the Northern Alliance (the Armed Neutrality) by Nelson in the battle of Copenhagen, and on the other hand the defeats inflicted on Austria, England’s continental ally, on whom she relied for her land forces, and the consequent Treaty of Lunéville, left England and France alike in a position which made them in 1802 anxious for a cessation of hostilities, the Treaty of Amiens being the result.