In this compelling new book, distinguished historian and writer Cassandra Pybus reveals that black convicts were among our first fleet settlers - a fact which profoundly complicates our understanding of race relations in early colonial Australia. Most of these black founders were originally slaves from America who had sought freedom with the British during the American Revolution only to find themselves abandoned and unemployed in England when the war was over. Pybus' stories include the notorious runaway 'Black Caesar', who became our first bushranger, and the wonderfully subversive Billie Bl