CHINA is famous for its great wall, but how many people know that India was once cut in two by a giant hedge built by the British?

This startling fact was uncovered by Evesham-born author Roy Moxham when he found a book called Rambles and Recollections of an Indian Official in a Charing Cross bookshop.

These memoirs referred in passing to a giant hedge manned by 12,000 men that stretched for over 2,500 miles across India in the latter half of the 19th century.

To begin with he didn't know whether to believe what he read: "It seemed pretty unlikely. I'd been to India four times already - why hadn't I seen any mention of it? And why had nobody else heard of it?

"My grandfather used to tell me things about the 1880s. Surely somebody must have heard stories."

Fascinated, Roy Moxham decided to look more closely into the matter.

At first his research yielded little solid information. Then he found another mention of the hedge in a dusty corner of the India Office Records near Blackfriar's Bridge. Here it was described by the Commissioner for Inland Customs for 1869-70 as: "a barrier which... is utterly impassable to man or beast."

The notion of a giant hedge initially struck the author as something amusingly British and harmless. But as his research progressed he began to see the hedge as something more sinister: "When I had first started my search for the Customs Hedge, I had been looking for a folly, a harmless piece of eccentricity. It had been a shock to find that the hedge was in reality a monstrosity; a terrible instrument of British oppression."

This oppression took the form of the hated salt tax which was rigorously enforced throughout the British Raj.

In the Bengal Presidency an ordinary family's salt could cost up to two month's wages. The tax had been introduced by the Mogul Emperors and was a principal source of revenue to the East India Company. To protect this income it was imperative to stem the flow of cheap salt from the semi-independent states to the west of India. To do this a customs line was begun which was increased and improved until it formed a barrier that stretched from the foothills of the Himalayas almost to the Bay of Bengal. At first the line was reinforced with cut thorn trees dragged into position and staked down. As this was susceptible to wind and fire the effort to create a live hedge was conceived. When complete the hedge was up to 14ft high and 12ft wide and made up the bulk of the customs line.

All that now remained was for Mr Moxham to search the plains and deserts of India to find some solid proof of the hedge. Until he did so his evidence would always be subject to scepticism.

This search took three years and covered thousands of miles. His book The Great Hedge of India is an engaging account of this quest and a fascinating insight into a murkier chapter of the British Raj.

Roy Moxham was born in Evesham High Street opposite Espley's, where his grandfather was the foreman, in 1939.

He was educated at Swan Lane Primary School and Prince Henry's Grammar. At 20 he left Evesham to spend five years as a tea planter in Malawi. On his return to England he set up a small gallery in Covent Garden selling African art. Now he is the curator and paper conservator at the University of London library. He continues to visit Evesham as his mother is still a resident of the town.

The Great Hedge of India is published by Constable and priced at £14.99.