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a series of patrol clashes with small parties of enemy, and rarely was there more thana pl of the bn engaged at one time. There were a few occasions when coys were usedagainst enemy posns, but there were no operations in which the bn was used as suchagainst an enemy posn.105On 17 February elements of the 61st Battalion linked with the 9th Battalion atMosigetta. Dexter ruefully recalled that his men had been beaten to the junctionby an hour, and that the men of the 9th Battalion had erected a signpost namingthe place ‘Matthews Junction’.106 Casualties had been light, although the battaliondid suffer its only officer killed on Bougainville when Lieutenant H.D. Robinsonwas ambushed on 1 February. Robinson had played a notable part in the battalion’sfighting at Milne Bay, for which he had been recommended for a Military Cross.107Both Dexter and Field noted that he was a fine officer and Dexter, in particular,‘felt his death keenly’.108 Such sentiments were shared by the troops.109While the 9th Battalion had beaten the 61st to Mosigetta, its advance had beendifficult. The old government road leading inland from Mawaraka was largelysurrounded by swamp, which made outflanking a succession of small Japanesedelaying positions along this axis very slow work. The battalion’s war diary notedthat on at least one occasion a patrol was forced to spend the night sitting on logsin a swamp.110 The Japanese also employed 75mm and 150mm guns against thebattalion’s advance, and whilst not particularly accurate this fire was disruptive.Strains in the battalion’s morale became evident early. On 29 January Matthewsrecorded a case of a suspected self-inflicted wound and an instance of a soldierrefusing to go on patrol, writing that ‘Once cowardice was punished by death105 ‘61 Aust Inf Bn Summary of Ops – Period 29 Jan to 7 May 45’, 20 May 1945, p. 1,AWM 54, Item 613/6/48. This four page document is significantly smaller and lessdetailed than the reports from the other battalions covering the same period.106 Dexter, ‘The Battalion – My Home’, p. 166, AWM PR01182, Item 4.107 Long’s conversation with C.H. Bicks, 10 February, AWM 67, Item 2/71.108 Field’s diary, 1 February 1945, AWM 3DRL6937, Item 7; Dexter, ‘The Battalion – MyHome’, p. 164, AWM PR01182, Item 4.109 Tod Schacht, My War On Bougainville: War Under the Southern Cross, AustralianMilitary History Publications, Loftus, 1999, p. 174; Watt, History of the 61st InfantryBattalion, p. 182.110 9 Infantry Battalion War Diary, 26 January 1945, January 1945, AWM 52, Item8/3/46.A tale of three battalions — 23