being expected to disband, some sources indicate that the commanders of the privateers—yet "mainly nobles from Mecklenburg"—did not, instead moving their base of operations to Visby, on the island of Gotland. (At this time, the storied German pirates Klaus Störtebeker and Michael Gödeke had not yet risen to command.) Organized as a brotherhood or guild, the Victual Brothers' main naval enemy in 1392 was the powerful Hanseatic town of Lübeck, which supported Denmark in the war. Apart from Lübeck, the Hanseatic League initially supported the Victual Brothers. Most of the Hanseatic towns had no desire for a victory for Denmark, with its strategic location for control of the seaways. For several years from 1392, the Victual Brothers were a strong power in the Baltic Sea. They had safe harbours in the cities of Rostock, Ribnitz, Wismar and Stralsund. They soon turned to open piracy and coastal plunder. In 1393 they captured the town of Bergen for the first time (plundering it again in 1429), proceeding in 1394 to Malmö and Visby. They occupied parts of Frisia and Schleswig, and plundered Turku, Vyborg, Styresholm, Korsholm and Faxeholm castle at Söderhamn in Hälsingland. At the climax of their power, the Victual Brothers occupied the island of Gotland, Sweden, in 1394 and set up their headquarters in Visby. They also operated from the Turku archipelago;[Knut Bosson, who was the chief of Turku Castle from 1395 to 1398, had allied himself with the people of Mecklenburg, and so he supported the hijacking activities of the Victual Brothers and allowed them to operate in the area. Maritime trade in the Baltic Sea virtually collapsed, and the herring industry suffered from their depredations. Queen Margaret even turned to King Richard II of England and sought to charter English ships to combat the pirates. From 1395 onwards, Queen Margaret gained the upper hand politically. She united Denmark, Sweden and Norway and formed the Kalmar Union. The Hanseatic League was forced to cooperate with her Decline King Albert of Sweden conceded Gotland to the allied Teutonic Order as a pledge (similar to a fiefdom), which was followed by an invasion led by Konrad von Jungingen (1355–1407), the Grand Master of the Order, who conquered the island in 1398—destroying Visby and driving the Victual Brothers out of Gotland. After the Victual Brothers' expulsion from Gotland in 1398, the Hanseatic League tried repeatedly but unsuccessfully to completely control the Baltic