The Foreign Cattle Market was taken over by the War Department in 1914, on a tenancy agreement from the City of London Corporation, for use as the Royal Army Service Corps Supply Reserve Depot. On several occasions after the Armistice traders and others urged that the market should be reopened; however, in 1924 the War Office exercised their option to buy it along with the adjacent the Sayes Court property for £400,500 () under deeds dated 25 March 1926, 18 March 1927 & 25 July 1927 including the railway, tramway, wharfage and jetty rights and easements.