Navy ships gang up on you now?

[Ms_Moofers]

Okay - thanks to prior thread I was finally able to get back on tonight after close to 3 weeks of having to turn the movies on to hear the music (yes, I know - get a life) - wanted to build my morale up on one of my pirates that had seen too many jail sentences and figured I go blow up a few ships - always helped in the past - so I sail out of Port Royal and I've got 6 or 7 Navy ships following me and shooting like crazy at me in my tiny sloop - barely made it back to port... is this something new? I had heard they fired back, but to gang up on you now? I hadn't even fired at any of them! Has this happened to anybody else and how on earth do you get past them? thanks mates!