Gachlau
Gachlau (also spelled Gaachlaau, Gachalaw, Gachlaw, Gachlauw, Gacholaw, Gatchlau, and Gatslau) is a village in Gilman municipality on Marbaa' in Yap State of the Federated States of Micronesia.
Gachlau is located at approximately 9.514266322 latitude and 138.1636453 longitude and is associated with the polling area of Anoth.
Caste and class
Gachlau is classified within the Yapese system of ranked villages associated with Tabinaw as Caste III, Class 7 (III–7–A).
This placed the village among the lower-ranked settlements within the broader Yapese political hierarchy.
Administrative and historical references
The 1968 Trust Territory Physical Planning Program, Final Report, Yap lists Gachalaw as Village No. 122 within Gilman municipality. The village number appears in parentheses, indicating that the settlement was considered uninhabited at the time of the survey.
The same survey places Gachalaw among the southern Gilman settlements together with nearby villages including Matibuw, Zabez, Muruuru, Tawoway, Anoth, Magchagil, and Guror.
Some ethnographic sources mistakenly associate Gachlaw with the traditional district of Dalipebinaw rather than modern Gilman municipality.
World War II
Gachlau appears in Yapese oral histories concerning the Japanese administration and the Second World War on Yap.
During the war years, the wider Gilman and southern Yap region was affected by Japanese military occupation, forced labor projects, food shortages, and repeated American bombing raids. Oral histories recorded from Yapese residents describe Japanese military activity in the village area during the final months of the war.
One wartime account recalls Yapese resident Peter Ianguchel bringing empty drums to the Japanese commander stationed at Gachlaw when news arrived that Japan had surrendered and the war had ended.
Archaeology
Gachlau was the subject of a dedicated archaeological investigation, Archaeological Survey of Gachlaw Village, Gilmon Municipality, Yap, FSM by William Hampton Adams, Sarah K. Campbell, and Richard E. Ross.
The survey documented settlement patterns, environmental history, cultural features, and Japanese military use of the village area during World War II. A later work, A Settlement Model for Gachlaw, further examined the organization and historic landscape of the village site.
