Caesar was most likely born in Madagascar, in about 1763. He was a slave on a sugar plantation (farm) in the West Indies. He ran away and went to London. On 17 March 1786, he was in court at Deptford, Kent for stealing 240 shillings. He was sent to the new country called Australia as a convict for seven years. He left on the Alexander, a convict transport ship in the First Fleet, in May 1787 and arrived in Botany Bay in January 1788.