150 years later, in 1808, the town hall acquired a different function.

Napoleon’s brother, Louis Napoleon, who had become the king of Holland two years before, decided to make the Town Hall his residence. Finding himself in an impoverished country, the twenty-seven-year-old Louis was moved with compassion. To his brother’s fury, he turned a blind eye to the trade between Holland and France’s archrival England, and so obstructed Napoleon’s efforts to isolate England economically from the rest of Europe.

The entire administration was moved out of the building. However, given the poor state of the country’s economy, it seemed wiser not to relocate the Exchange Bank. But, a palace with an Exchange Bank on its premises was certainly something out …