When Sir Peter Carew fled the country, suspected of plotting against Queen Mary, Andrew Tremayne embarked with him at Weymouth, and later Nicholas joined his twin in France, and they threw in their lot with a troop of adventurers who harassed the Channel. Froude has said: 'The sons of honourable houses ... dashed out upon the waters to revenge the Smithfield massacres. They found help where it could least have been looked for: Henry II of France hated heresy, but he hated Spain worse. Sooner than see England absorbed in the Spanish monarchy, he forgot his bigotry in his politics. He furnished these young mutineers with ships and money and letters of marque. The Huguenots were their natural friends; with Rochelle for an arsenal, they held the mouth of the Channel, and harassed the communications between Cadiz and Antwerp.' Occasionally the twins met with ill-luck, and an entry in the Acts of the Privy Council records that: 'To be committed to several prisons, to be kept secret, without having conference with any ... Andrew Tremayne to the Marshalsey and Nicholas Tremayne to the Gate House, suspected of piracy.' Afterwards they went back to their life of risks and chances on the high seas. But when Elizabeth came to the throne a different view was taken of these rovers. 'Privateering suited Elizabeth's convenience,' says Froude. 'Time was wanted to restore the Navy. The privateers were a resource in the interval ... they were really the armed force of the country.' So (in 1559) instructions were sent to the English Ambassador in Paris that certain gentlemen, among whom were the Tremaynes, 'as shall serve their country, the Ambassador shall himself comfort them to return home. Circumspection must be used.' The postscript is characteristically cautious.