The Welsh Fusiliers also took part in the reduction of Martinique, one of the French West Indian islands, which was compelled to surrender after a gallant resistance. In those stirring times a regiment seldom remained long in one place, and in 1812 we find them in Spain, where they were present at the battle of Albuera and the siege of Badajoz, which was defended by the French with obstinate valour. Many of our men perished in the breaches, and every species of missile was hurled upon them as they attempted to scale the walls. “Never, probably, since the invention of gunpowder,” says Colonel Jones, “were men more exposed to its action than those assembled to assault the breaches.” For two hours, shells, hand-grenades, and bags of gunpowder were hurled upon our men as they crowded into the ditch; when they rushed up the breach their passage was arrested by ponderous beams bristling with sword-blades, and loose planks studded with sharp iron points, which tilted up the moment they were trodden on, and precipitated the assailants into the ditch below. Again and again our men rushed against the glittering sword-blades and were shot down by the enemy from the walls above; the rear pressed on, and tried to make a bridge of the writhing bodies of their slaughtered comrades. About midnight 2000 men had fallen, and Wellington was about to give orders to retire, when he received notice that Picton had taken the castle by escalade. “Then the place is ours,” he exultingly exclaimed, and sent word to Picton to retain the castle at all hazards. The attack was continued, and next morning Philippon, the French general, surrendered to Lord Fitzroy Somerset, better known to this generation as Lord Raglan. We must draw the veil of sorrow over the fearful scenes which were enacted by an infuriated soldiery when the devoted city fell into their hands; for three days all discipline was at an end, and the tumult only subsided when the rioters were exhausted with their excesses. We cannot give the exact loss of the Welsh Fusiliers, but, in common with all the other British regiments engaged in this siege, they suffered severely.