Travel Diaries (2)- chattel houses in Barbados

During any trip to the Caribbean, you are always reminded of the history of the West Indies through the colonial past and the sad  and shameful slave trade which took place from the 16th to 19th centuries. Tours in many of the islands include visits to plantation houses where sugar cane or other exotic crops were cultivated,  visits to Forts, defence buildings and garrisons which were used by  the armies of colonial rulers to defend their precious overseas territories and trade routes,  visits to  Parish churches and Abbeys built by Europeans who introduced their religious beliefs to these new frontiers. 

Visiting Barbados you cannot fail to notice some very small colourful houses, and we photographed quite a few of them around the island as they seem to be part of the Barbadian landscape.

They are called “chattel houses” and we thought their origin was quite interesting.

Chattel houses are small modest homes which were built by plantation workers – former slaves – who were allowed to build these wooden buildings as homes on plantation land. They were built of timber and without nails, to allow them to be easily and quickly disassembled should the worker quit his job or be fired by the rich plantation owner. The house was the worker’s “chattel” or movable possession, and as such he would take it with him and re-assemble it somewhere else, as originally the workers did not own the land on which their houses were built.

Chattel houses were not built on solid foundations, but on stand-alone foundations made of stones or coral blocks as you can see in the picture above, and these blocks would also be taken away to rebuild the house somewhere else.

The front facade of the house is symmetrical with the door in the middle and a window on either side.
Initially the owner would build a small single unit with only two internal rooms. When the family expanded and they had extra funds, an addition or shed with a roof would be built at the back, transforming it into a two-roof house.

Barbados chattel house with addition (two-roof house)

An additional part is sometimes built at the front, to be used as another room or a gabled porch or a veranda, and houses were painted in bright vivid colours.

Chattel house with addtional room and veranda at the front

Many chattel houses are still lived in as homes today, they have been connected to water and electricity and spruced up, and some have been freshly restored for tourists to visit.

Colourful chattel house with large veranda, by Bathsheba beach in Barbados

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{{from Carrington, Sean; Fraser, Henry (2003) "Chattel House" A~Z of Barbados Heritage Macmillan Caribbean, p. 43}}
After "Emancipation", the slaves were still landless, since most of the land was still owned by the plantations. Through the Located Labours Act of 1840 former slaves were allowed to build their humble homes on marginally productive plantation lands, at 'peppercorn' rent, but the plantation owners reserved the right to evict tenants from these tenantries at short notice. Houses therefore had to be 'chattel', which means 'movable possession', and for this reason were built of timber, and so constructed that they could be easily dismantled in sections, moved to another spot on an ox-cart (today a truck), and reassembled in a single day, and yet be able to survive this with minimal damage.

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A special Thank You today to Annie at Beanstalk Coaching for recommending Our Adventure in Croatia for the One Lovely Blog Award.
We didn’t meet Annie in Blogoland, but in CaribbeanLand… Annie is a coach, charity chief executive and a writer, having recently published her novels which you can check out at these LINKS
Poison Pen and Charity begins with Murder !!!