For a time in the 1890s, 'Beechwood' on the Windsor Road was the residence of Princess Soltykoff, widow of the late Prince Alexis Soltykoff of Russia, and in August 1894 it was the site of a daring robbery.

It was thought that it was carried out by a highly trained gang, because of the slickness of the operation. The robbery took place at around 10pm on August 1st, and the burglars entered the Princess's boudoir by means of a ladder. They then locked the rooms from the inside before proceeding to ransack them.

The burglars escaped with over £3,000 worth of jewellery, but it would have been much worse had they not been interrupted shortly after arriving. At ten past ten, the daughter of Mrs Croker, a house guest, tried to get into one of the locked rooms, thus raising the alarm.

Had they not been disturbed, the burglars would have had time to empty the safe, for which they had discovered the keys, and which contained jewellery worth around £100,000.

Some of the stolen goods were recovered one year later. A boatman, punting in a tributary off the Thames near Eton College, turned up a purse with his pole. In the subsequent search, two more purses and the Princess's card case were discovered. This indicated that the thieves had approached and escaped via the river, rather than the railway as had previously been thought, but despite this new find, the thieves were never caught.