It was discovered that Robert Hitchins had been all his life given to piracy, so, after having been arrested in the Channel Isles, he was executed at low-water mark near St. Martin’s Point, Guernsey, and there his body was left in chains as a warning to others. The rest of the prisoners were afterwards ordered by Elizabeth to be set free, “after a good and sharp admonition to beware hereafter to fall again into the damage of our laws.” They were bidden to return to their native places and to get their living by honest labour. It is a proof that the Crown really valued her seamen by an interesting proclamation that was made in 1572 when there was a likeliness of war. The Queen went so far as to promise pardon for all piracies hitherto committed by any mariners who should now put their ships into her naval service, and we must not forget that, at a later date, the first tidings of the Armada’s advent were brought into Plymouth by a patriotic English pirate named Fleming. “Fleming,” wrote John Smith, the great Elizabethan traveller and founder of the English colony of Virginia, “was as expert and as much sought for” as any other pirates of the Queen’s reign, “yet such a friend to his Country, that discovering the Spanish Armado, he voluntarily came to Plymouth, yeelded himselfe freely to my Lord Admirall, and gave him notice of the Spaniards comming; which good warning came so happily and unexpectedly, that he had his pardon, and a good reward.” “As in all lands,” writes this delightful Elizabethan, “where there are many people, there are some theeves, so in all seas much frequented, there are some pirates; the most ancient within the memory of threescore yeares was one Callis, who most refreshed himselfe upon the Coast of Wales; Clinton and Pursser his companions, who grew famous, till Queene Elizabeth of blessed memory, hanged them at Wapping.” Now this John Callis or Calles, after his arrest, wrote a letter of repentance to Walsyngham saying: “I bewail my former wicked life, and beseech God and Her Majesty to forgive me. If she will spare my life and use me in her service by sea, with those she can trust best, either to clear the coasts of other wicked pirates or otherwise, as I know their haunts, roads, creeks, and maintainers so well, I can do more therein than if she sent ships abroad and spent £20,000.”