THE tale goes that the grass on reclaimed land, where the sea once flowed between mainland Guernsey and Le Clos du Valle, has a salty tang. As I have yet to suss a way of communicating with the local bovine community, I will take the suggestion very seriously while passing on actually trying it for myself.

But it makes sense.

Just 201 years ago, where today you will find main link roads such as Route Militaire and Braye Road, hundreds of homes and two major industrial estates, was sea.

It may not have been deep and blue, but it was sea nevertheless and at high tide there was but one way to cross between mainland Gvarnsey (period spelling) and the Clos du Valle: The Bridge. But it wasn’t called that at the time.

Pre 1805, it was Le Grand Pont, or Pont du Diable (the devil’s bridge).

Nowadays there may be a growing number of hooded little devils spoiling the image of Guernsey’s second harbour, but the devilish connection stemmed from the unscheduled arrival in Guernsey of Robert the First, Duke of Normandy, in 1032.

While many modern-day Roberts are otherwise known as Robs, Bobs, Robbies or Bobbys, Duke Robert had the rather unkind sobriquet of Robert the Devil.

Local tradition has it that the devil built a causeway to gain access to Vale Castle and that the devil might have been the Duke of Normandy, whose fleet and large army ran aground here 975 years ago.

If Robert’s engineers built the Bridge, it was no more than a crude effort and nothing like the line of boulders with gaps through which the sea could pass, topped with wooden planks, which was put in place early in the 13th century.

Nearly six hundred years later, it would seem not much had changed.

But then, fortunately, along came Sir John Doyle, lt-governor of Guernsey from 1803 to 1816.

With France and England once again at each other’s throats, a nervous Sir John believed a French invasion to be imminent and the virtually undefended Clos du Valle an easy target.

But while he eyed a reclamation of the Braye, the Trotts, Fallas and Torodes of the time wanted to deepen and widen it to enable better access for stone-laden ships from the northern-parish quarries.

Sir John got his way and by 1814 the island was shown on maps as one solid mass.

Nearly 300 acres were reclaimed and in truth it was a relatively painless and simple exercise.

In 1806, tenders went out for the construction of dams at both ends of the Braye and within two years, it was complete.

At the Grand Havre end Thomas Henry built an embankment out of large boulders and a brick wall to keep the sea out, with a gravel bank piled against the wall.

In time, it had to be further strengthened by unwanted quarry stone.

At the Bridge, a stone wall was built parallel with the bridge, then filled with clay.

Sluices were incorporated at both ends of the Braye to allow surface water to escape.

The French for sluice is ‘nocq’ and, of course, St Sampson’s retains its own Nocq Road to this day.

How long it took to drain the area is unclear but in 1811 Sir John sold the reclaimed land to six local landowners for the sum of £5,000.

By 1928 the land had been sub-divided to 160 proprietors.

Were there losers in all this?

Is modern-day Guernsey worse off for the decision? Long term, did Sir John do us a disservice?

Just imagine what lives we might have if Guernsey were still divided and the two parts connected only at the eastern and western ends of the Braye.

Well, if something similar were to be proposed in the 21st century, there would surely be a resounding ‘no’ from property owners unwilling to give up their front-garden access to the nautical playground.

Think Poole’s estuary and you perhaps get an idea of what might have been had the Braye remained.

Back in the early 1800s, the saltpan owners were compensated for their loss of income. But compensation to owners and the cost of the Crown-owned Braye totalled just £3,250.

Sir John had got his wish and made a profit. The six original purchasers of the reclaimed land were Pierre Yves Bardel, Henry Giffard, Daniel Mollet, Pierre Mollet, Isaac Carre and Jean Allez.