Being thus reduced to a skeleton, the officers and non-commissioned officers proceeded to England in January 1807, for the purpose of recruiting the ranks of the second battalion, and arrived at Liverpool on the 30th of that month. Having distributed recruiting parties to various stations, the head-quarters marched to Edmonton and Enfield, near London. On the 29th of October 1807, His Majesty King George III. was pleased to direct that the county title of the THIRTY-NINTH regiment should be changed from EAST MIDDLESEX to DORSETSHIRE. [Sidenote: 1808. 1st Batt.] The flank companies of the first battalion proceeded from Malta to Sicily in May 1808. [Sidenote: 2nd Batt.] The recruiting continued from the militia and in the ordinary mode with such success that the second battalion was soon increased to five hundred strong; and after being some time stationed at Berry-Head, embarked from thence for Guernsey, where it arrived on the 24th of May 1808. Subsequently, a general volunteering from the militia took place, when the battalion was augmented to about seven hundred rank and file, and being organised in the course of a short period, Lieut.-General Sir John Doyle, Bart., then Lieut.-Governor of Guernsey, was so pleased with the general appearance of the corps as to express his entire satisfaction with it, and to report the battalion fit for immediate foreign service. [Sidenote: 1809. 1st Batt.] In June 1809, Lieut.-General Sir John Stuart, commanding in chief in the Mediterranean, resolved to menace the capital and kingdom of Naples, as a diversion in favour of the Austrians, who were contending against numerous difficulties in their war with France. The flank companies of the first battalion were employed on this service; and after menacing a considerable extent of coast, which produced much alarm, the romantic and fruitful island of _Ischia_, celebrated for the beauty of its scenery, and situated in the Bay of Naples, about six miles from the coast, was attacked. A landing was effected in the face of a formidable line of batteries, from which the enemy was speedily driven. The siege of the castle was undertaken, and in a few days the garrison was forced to surrender. The island of _Procida_ surrendered on being summoned. Two valuable islands were thus rescued from the power of the Grand Duke of Berg, General Murat, upon whom the Emperor Napoleon had, in the preceding year, conferred the sovereignty of Naples, in succession to Joseph Bonaparte, who had been nominated by his brother to be King of Spain; and one thousand five hundred regular troops, with one hundred pieces of ordnance, were captured. An attempt was, at this period, made to reduce the castle of _Scylla_; but the large force which the enemy possessed in Calabria, rendered this impracticable. [Sidenote: 2nd Batt.]