A hired Castilian fleet turns to piracy

France paid de la Cerda's Castilian force 20,000 florins to attack or blockade English Channel ports while negotiations for a truce continued. When the June agreement included the Castilians and Philip VI stopped paying them, the fleet chose to preserve its income through independent piracy. Its ships received wooden castles, raised fighting platforms at bow and stern, and crow's nests that favored missile troops above an enemy deck. Flemish crossbowmen and other hired fighters added to their boarding strength. English accounts had an incentive to magnify the terror these raiders caused because Edward's later victory looked greater against a formidable threat. The organized commerce raiding was dangerous, but its portrayal was also shaped by royal propaganda.