It was obvious that the Bikini leaders refused to accept
the fact that they would not be allowed to return to Bikini
some day and for that reason preferred to suffer the hardships
of neighboring Rongerik to a new move, in hope of being able
to return to their ancestral home.
It was decided however, that, the best interests of the
Bikini people would be served by transferring them to Ujilang
St me ea ee ee cen ee preneemen ee
Atoll, the westernmost of the Marshalls.
Ujilang belonged to
the government, as heir to the Imperial Japanese government
which had seized it from its former German ownevs, who had
“purchased” the tiny atoll from its former chief.
A group of Bikini men and Navy Seabees arrived at Ujiiang
in late November to prepare a village for another resettlement
attempt.
Shortly after their arrival, an annoucement was made
that the atoll of Enewetak, west of Bikini, and north of
Ujilang, would be commandeered as another testing ground for
atomic weapons.
It was then decided that the Enewetak inhabi-
_ tants would be resettled on Ujilang.
This left the ex-Bikini
people right where they were six months earlier, but
undoubtedly with increased feelings of insecurity, frustration
and general bewilderment.
In January of 1948 Anthropologist Leonard Mason of the
. Universityof Hawaii, made a field investigation of the prohlen
at the request of the Navy.
He found among other things that
the relocated Bikinians were suffering serious hardships on
Rongerik, and, despite a well-organized communal organization