The great hedge of India - Roy Moxham

This is the story of a quest, in the author's words 'a ridiculous obsession', sparked off by the chance purchase for 25 in a Charing Cross Road bookshop of some memoirs by a 19th-century British official.
The memoirs referred in passing to a great hedge planted across the Indian sub-continent, manned and cared for by 12,000 men. It stood for more than 50 years and, at its greatest extent, formed part of a barrier 2,500 miles long. One of the largest man-made constructions in human history it appears in no history books and today remains completely forgotten in both Britain and India.
Inspired by the idea of such a gargantuan enterprise and its extraordinary disappearance, Roy Moxham began his researches in the British Library and the India Office Archive. Eventually he set off to India to discover whether it had indeed existed, what its purpose had been and whether any part of it remained.

The memoirs referred in passing to a great hedge that by the 1850s ran for 1,500 miles across India. It was planted as part of a Customs Line established by the East India company which stretched from the Himalayas to Orissa. Manned by 12,000 men to extort the hated Salt Tax,it was one of the greatest constructions in human history, yet it appears in almost no history books and today seems completely forgotten in both Britain and India. Inspired by the idea of such a gargantuan enterprise and its extraordinary disappearance, Roy Moxham began his researches in the British Library and the India Office Archive. Eventually he set off to India to discover whether it had indeed existed, what its purpose had been and whether any part of it remained.