Towards the close of Elizabeth's reign, two Dutch ships of the Hanse Towns League, and therefore under special protection, sailed into Falmouth Harbour, driven there either by the Spaniards or by stress of weather. They had scarcely arrived before Dame Killigrew, accompanied by some ruffians, boarded the Dutch ships, slew the owners, and seized two hogsheads of pieces of eight, which she took 'for her own use.' This high-handed proceeding of course produced remonstrances on the part of the rightful proprietors of the money, and led to the trial, conviction, and execution of all the offenders, save the lady herself, at Launceston. She barely escaped, and not without the utmost interest having been made for her with the Queen by Sir John Arundell, of Tolverne, and Sir Nicholas Hals, of Pengerswick. Nor was this the only irregularity for which the authorities of Pendennis were complained of. In 1631 the Castle guns were fired upon the King's ships! and on the 2nd November in that year a Captain Kettleby writes thus: 'None disturb the free trade in those parts more than the Captain of Pendennis Castle--he is at peace with neither King's ships, nor others--both the Admiral and the writer have been twice shot at by him in going in and out. The last shot fell in the town of St. Mawes, but only hurt one woman.' Possibly the explanation of such apparently wanton mischief as this is to be found in the rivalry which existed for precedence between the two castles, Pendennis and St. Mawes, on opposite sides of the harbour mouth--a rivalry so intense as to have finally rendered a compromise indispensable. Whether the details of the story of Dame Mary, or Dame Jane (an 'old Jezebel,' as her enemies called her) be true or not; whether it be a distorted reproduction of some of the misdeeds of her father-in-law, the third John; or whether the real cause of the misunderstanding between her husband and her faithless self was the now fast-growing rivalry between the ports of Penryn and Falmouth--this much at least is certain: that in the year 1633 Dame Jane gave to the mayor of 'Permarin,' and his successors in office for ever, a handsome silver chalice, still used as a loving-cup at the mayor-choosings, on which it is recorded that the Penryn mayor succoured her when she was 'in greate miserie.'[58] The unhappy pair were divorced, without issue; the husband dying in 1632 or 1636, and his wife twelve years afterwards.