AWI Buildings

[kingsmt]

I scratchbuilt these slaves quarters for the AWI/ACW time periods.

Some years ago, I saw a photo in a wargame's book, or magazine, that showed these type buildings.
They looked simple enough to me and so I made them.

They were made from balsa wood, using a sharp pencil to draw in planking.
I stained the wood with a mixture of Iso Alcohol and a drop or two of black ink.
It gives raw wood a nice gray, aged look. Learned that one from model railroaders

I think I'll use my Dunmore's Ethiopians with these buildings. Maybe a skirmish with some Militia?
I've got the regular Perry Ethiopian figures, but I've added some conversions from the Foundry "Maroons" line.
And a Foundry Pirate or several!

[carlos marighela]

Nice bit of modelling and it does seem your compatriots need to be frequently reminded of their past and how it has shaped their present.

[bluewillow]

Great work,

By adding thatch they would work in the Caribbean or even South American colonies for slave accommodation for the Spanish, French and English sugar and tobacco plantations.

Cheers
Matt

[carlos marighela]

Great work,

By adding thatch they would work in the Caribbean or even South American colonies for slave accommodation for the Spanish, French and English sugar and tobacco plantations.

Cheers
Matt

The senzala in Brazil and its equivalent in much of the Spanish colonies tended to be a wattle and daub affair in their most rudimentary form and, at least in Brazil, could be quite substantial structures depending on the wealth of the owner and the number of slaves held.  As an example, I used to live about a five minute walk uphill from the Solar do Unhão in Salvador, which was a very old sugar mill. The slave quarters were very robustly built out of masonry, they were essentially, the basement/ground floor of the mansion itself. There's a restaurant where the slaves were once housed these days.

[vtsaogames]

Some years back I took a tour of the Laura Plantation upriver from new Orleans. In some shacks out back, much like your models but more run down, was the one that Antoine Dominique Domino Jr. was raised in, back in the share-cropper days. AKA Fats Domino.

The Laura Plantation tours are far superior to the usual plantation tours. Letters and memoirs reveal which slave owners fathered which slaves, etc. I toured another plantation in Louisiana that referred to "servants". Servants are free to leave and seek employment elsewhere, I believe.