Mrs Dandeson Coates Crowther, daughter-in-law of Bishop Samuel Crowther; image from the cover of African and Caribbean People in Britain: A History

HISTORIAN Hakim Adi’s starting point for his latest book, African and Caribbean People in Britain, is not the Empire Windrush’s arrival at Tilbury from Jamaica in 1948, not even the Roman Legion of North African soldiers at Hadrian’s Wall in Cumbria in the third century, but Somerset 10,000 years ago.

It was here that Cheddar Man was unearthed, the oldest modern human to be discovered in Britain. Recent analysis of his skeletal remains suggest that the earliest Britons had “dark to black skin”, having originated from Africa but not yet undergone the evolutionary development that would lead to changes in pigmentation.

Like Peter Fryer 40 years before him in his seminal book Staying Power, Adi sets out to provide a general overview of the black presence. But he also builds on advances in science that have taken place since, enabling him to dig back further, as well as introduce fresh information that has materialised from the archives.

DNA technology on the remains of victims of the Black Death in the 14th century in Smithfield reveals that some were of African origin. Why they were living in England or how they got here is open to speculation. But Mary Ann Macham, a fugitive slave who stowed away from Virginia to settle in North Shields in the 1830s, took the trouble of telling us in a handwritten account of her life that has come to light.

The book’s cover picture shows the little-known Mrs Dandeson Coates Crowther, daughter-in-law of Bishop Samuel Crowther, the first African bishop in the Anglican Church, one of a small community of influential black Victorians.

Mrs Crowther was a member of the London-based Missionary Leaves Association, which supported evangelical projects around the world and published a popular monthly magazine

Over 500 or so pages, Adi lays to rest the “Windrush myth” that has come to symbolise the starting point of Black Britain thereby obscuring a much longer history and only giving prominence to the experiences of those who migrated to Britain from the Caribbean in the post-war period.

There are records of named Africans arriving on these shores in Tudor and Stuart times from once Moorish-ruled Iberia.

They often worked as skilled craftsmen or musicians, including in royal courts and households, and by all accounts were well paid and respected.

Britain’s increasing involvement in the slave trade and the rapid expansion of its global empire fundamentally changed its relationship with Africans.

The communities human trafficking, slavery and colonialism threw up all over Britain and their efforts to organise against this is documented in comprehensive detail.

Along the way, are the intriguing stories of the individuals involved and their struggles and achievements.

It is long journey, ending in the present, but one which Adi, a professor in African history, manages to navigate and connect up in an admirably clear and measured fashion.

• African and Caribbean People in Britain: A History. By Hakim Adi. Allen Lane, £30