It goes back to the last century (at least) and especially after the war ended, many Italians came over looking for work and in this area there was a proliferation of clay pits which housed many brick-making sites and there was always plenty of work available. Some immigrants worked on the land, others on the railways and, gradually, the community grew and grew.
If you ever went through Peterborough on the train to London, the south side of the city was where you could see a plethora of tall chimney stacks, indicating kilns in the brick works. They numbered over 100 as I recall. Now, there is only one working yard left and that is near Whittlesey; there are just three chimney stacks left today and the vast majority of the former pits were filled with fly-ash from the coal-fired power stations in the very late 70s/early 80s. That land was eventually reclaimed for house building and today there are two or three massive estates where there used to be none.
I hope that helps a bit GB...