Slab hut facts for kids
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| Places: | Australia and New Zealand |
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| Materials: | Timber, bark, mud, clay, stone, Galvanized iron. |
| Uses: | dwellings, shops, farm outbuildings. |
A slab hut is a type of dwelling or shed built from pieces of split or sawn timber. Settlers in Australia and New Zealand often used this building style during their early colonial times.
Contents
Early Homes: Huts and Humpies
Building in Australia's Early Days
When Europeans first settled in Australia in 1788, they had to build homes with what they had. There were not many skilled carpenters, and tools and nails were hard to find. The early colonists used natural materials. They tried a method called "wattle and daub," where they wove branches and covered them with mud. But Australia's heavy summer rains often washed these walls away.
Soon, walls made of timber slabs became popular. When settlers moved away from Sydney, they found lots of good timber in the forests. They quickly built huts and "humpies" from timber poles and large sheets of bark. These were often temporary homes. Australian hardwoods were tough to work with, but settlers learned to be their own builders.
Over time, slab buildings became a common sight in rural Australia. Some were important buildings like shops, schools, and churches. Even large farmhouses were built this way. As tools and building skills improved, slab huts became stronger and more detailed. They became a symbol of early Australia, just like a thatched cottage in England or a log cabin in early America.
New Zealand Settlers' Homes
European settlers in New Zealand also had to build with local materials and simple tools. They often used the Maori word whare (house) for their temporary or first homes.
One writer noted that a small amount of money could build a "sod hut" or a cabin from timber slabs. A tent with a timber frame and sod chimney could also work. These simple homes protected people from the weather. It was often smart for new settlers to start with small homes. They might need to move later for better jobs or wages.
Materials for Slab Huts
Australian Building Materials
Most slab huts in Australia were made from timber and bark. Settlers found that certain Eucalyptus trees were easy to split into slabs. These included blackbutt, bluegum, stringybark, ironbark, and turpentine. Some of these timbers also resisted termites.
The chimney was often made of wood. Sometimes, sods (pieces of earth with grass) were used. The fireplace might have stones inside, covered with mud or clay.
New Zealand Building Materials
New Zealand settlers used different materials for roofs, like thatch from raupo, toitoi, flax, fern, or totara bark. They built tents with poles, saplings, canvas, and planks. They also made huts from tree-fern or more lasting homes from clay, sods, wattle and daub, or stone.
How Walls Were Made
A slab hut is really a building with "slab walls." The walls were made from "flitches," which are pieces of timber split from a tree trunk. Builders would cut down trees and saw them into lengths. Then, they split these lengths into flitches using a maul (a heavy hammer) and a wedge.
The timber was split along its natural grain. This was different from the traditional British way of splitting from the center of the tree. Settlers did not have time or tools to properly shape the timber into planks. They used the wood when it was still "green" (freshly cut).
Roofs and Ceilings
Builders placed Rafters on top of the slab walls to create a sloped roof. Huts were kept small so that they did not need complex roof supports called trusses. Ceilings were not always included. If a ceiling was added, it was mainly used for storage. Slab dwellings with a second storey (upper floor) were very rare.
A bark roof was common because it was quick and easy to build. Large sheets of bark were peeled from living trees and laid on small sapling poles. Holes were made in the bark sheets, and they were tied to the rafters with cords made from tree bark. Wooden pins were used instead of expensive nails. Doors and window shutters also turned on wooden pivots instead of metal hinges.
Thatching was less common, but rushes and blady grass were sometimes used. Later, straw from crops was used. For a more permanent home, shingles (thin pieces of wood) were cut. The cabbage tree palm and later the she-oak were good for shingles. Later, galvanised iron became popular for roofs because it was cheap and lasted a long time. Sometimes, this iron was put over the original shingles.
Wall Linings and Coatings
Whether a slab hut was lined inside or out depended on the owner's money, effort, and taste. Beyond keeping out the weather, people wanted their homes to look nice and feel comfortable.
Thin strips of wood called Battens might be nailed over the gaps between the slabs. Or, the entire outside might be covered with weatherboards. The outside could then be painted with mixes of skim milk, quick-lime, lampblack, and cement. Or, it could be covered completely with plaster. These steps helped protect the building, not just make it look better.
The inside walls might be covered with plaster made from mud, clay, or cow-dung. The inside of the slabs might be painted white or covered with newspaper. More fancy linings for the ceiling included sailcloth, hessian, calico, or even wallpaper.
Floors in Slab Huts
The floor of a slab hut might just be the ground it was built on. But often, mixtures of sand, clay, cow-dung, and similar materials were laid down. This made a firmer, more level, or tougher indoor surface.
Crushed and watered termite mounds were also used for flooring. Termites mix their saliva, faeces, and other things to bind soil particles in their mounds. This type of flooring was called "ant bed." These floors needed regular care, like watering them to make them solid again, or adding a new layer.
Sometimes, timber slabs were laid directly on the earth to make a floor. More advanced and permanent homes had proper sawn floorboards nailed onto bearers (support beams).
How Slab Huts Were Designed and Built
The basic slab hut design came from simple English farm huts. These were rectangular shelters with one door and maybe some openings for air. Later, people might add inner walls to create separate rooms. Australian settlers often added a verandah (a covered porch).
Most slab hut building used "bush carpentry" skills. Early settlers usually did not have much money or time for fancy homes. They first needed to clear their land and plant crops or build fences. Later, new settlers often had to build a home quickly to meet the rules of buying land. On goldfields or in timber areas, people just needed a quick, temporary home.
Many early settlers were manual workers. They were good at "making do" with what they had. Others learned by watching or helping skilled builders. An average settler could build a basic hut in two or three weeks, then add to it later.
The two main ways to build slab hut walls were by placing the slabs vertically (up and down) or horizontally (side to side).
Vertical Slab Walls
One writer, Alexander Harris, described the vertical method. First, holes were dug about two feet deep for posts. These posts, about ten feet high, were squared with an axe. Along the ground between the posts, and at the top, were "ground-plates" and "wall-plates." These plates had a groove cut into them. The ends of the eight-foot slabs were fitted into these grooves.
The floorboards were six inches wide and one inch thick. Because the timber was green and the heat was strong, wider boards would curl up. The rooms had joists at the top, and bark was spread on them to create a storage space. Openings were left in the walls for windows. The chimneys were large, like old farmhouses. They had a small wall of rough stone and mortar inside for safety. A large, fire-resistant stone formed the hearth (fireplace floor).
Another writer, Peter Cunningham, also described this method. He said a wooden house could be built with very few nails. He knew of a house 24 feet long by 12 feet wide, with an attached lean-to, built for only eight pounds. This house was thatched, had a chimney, and four rooms. With plastering, whitewashing, and fitting doors and windows, it cost less than twenty pounds. A verandah helped keep the house cool by shading the walls from the sun.
If only a top plate was used, the top of each slab was pushed into the groove. The bottom of the slab was just set into a trench. If a bottom plate was used, it also had a groove. Each slab was slid in from one end of these plates. A piece was cut out at one end of the bottom groove to widen it and allow slabs to fit. This piece was replaced after the last slab was in. Another way was to make a deeper groove in the top plate. Each slab was lifted into the deep top groove, then dropped into the bottom one.
A third method was to nail planks on either side of the wall plates to create a channel for the slabs. This was faster but needed sawn timber and nails. Slabs were sometimes shaped at the ends to fit into the grooves. Each method took more time and effort but created a stronger and more lasting building.
Vertical Slab Walled Church (Around 1838)
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Slabs chamfered
to fit bottom plate -
Corner post of undressed timber -
Saw-marks in corner post -
Battens nailed over gaps
Horizontal Slab Walls
Mrs. Aeneas Gunn described their homestead in the Northern Territory. Its walls were built using the "drop-slab-panel system." This meant upright panels were made of three-foot slabs cut from the outside of tree trunks. These slabs were dropped horizontally, one on top of the other, between grooved posts. This was a simple and quick way to build. Outside, the walls had a wavy surface from the natural curves of the timber. Inside, the walls were flat and smooth. Because every third panel had a door or window, and the horizontal slabs stopped two feet from the ceiling, the building was very airy and open on all sides.
Instead of grooving the posts, builders could nail battens (thin strips of wood) on either side of the uprights to form a channel. The slabs were then fitted inside these channels.
It is not clear which method was more popular. Both types of slab huts still exist today. The horizontal method allowed for shorter timber pieces, but it needed more upright posts to hold them.
Slab Huts in Books
Slab huts appear often in famous Australian literature.
In stories, Henry Lawson's Drover's Wife lives in a slab hut. So does his Bush Undertaker. Many parts of A Day on a Selection take place in or around a slab hut. Lawson also describes a horizontal-slab shearing shed in Stragglers, calling it a "cubby house" style of building.
Miles Franklin's character Sybylla Melvyn grew up in a "comfortable, wide-veranda'ed, irregularly built slab house." She went to a "little slab school house." Richard Mahony quickly fixed up his goldfields house and store for his new wife. He added a wall to separate the slab-walled part of the house from the log and canvas front. He also filled the gaps between the slabs with putty.
Steele Rudd's Our New Selection describes his family's first farm house: It was a slabbed house with a shingled roof. It had space for two rooms, but no inner wall. The floor was earth. Dad used a mix of sand and fresh cow-dung to keep it level. He would put it on about once a month, and everyone had to stay outside until it dried. There were no locks on the doors; pegs kept them closed at night. The slabs were not very close together, so they could easily see people coming on horseback through the cracks. The children would count the stars through the cracks in the roof.
In true stories, Louisa Anne Meredith thought slab homes were "the least pleasing objects." She blamed poor building and neglect on high wages and lazy workers. Ralph Rashleigh described a convict-run theatre made of slabs and bark. The gaps were filled with mud, and the inside was painted white with pipeclay, which looked good by candlelight.
Rachel Henning wrote about building their slab homestead on their Queensland farm. The house was moved during her time there. She noted that moving a slab house was not hard because all the wood could be taken down and put back up.
Mrs. Aeneas Gunn wrote about the joy of building their slab homestead from scratch. In his book A Fortunate Life, Bert Facey described how he built a slab house for a farmer, after learning from others.
Slab Huts in New Zealand Books
In Frank Melton's Luck (1891), a character says he bought land and needs someone to manage it. He plans to have contractors quickly build a slab hut, and a tent will do until it is ready.
In the Shadow of the Bush (1899) describes a slab hut, or wharé, in a clearing. It was a single room, made entirely of split timber, but neatly built. The roof and chimney were made of iron. The large, wide chimney took up almost one end of the room. Two small windows let in light.
A Maori Maid (1898) describes a rough whare on a hillside. The roof was thatched with totara bark. The walls were unplaned totara wood slabs, placed vertically. There was no inner lining or floorboards, just hard, dry clay. The window was an opening with white linen instead of glass. Almost one whole end of the hut was a fireplace. The chimney was wood, with large stones and clay at the bottom to protect from flames. The main character, John, lived simply to save money for farm improvements. He planned to build a better home later, after building a good woolshed.
Slab Huts in Art
Paintings by Augustus Earle and S.T. Gill often show slab buildings. Gill even showed how timber was split for slabs. William Strutt's sketch of a settler's hut shows the tools used. John Skinner Prout's Interior of Settlers Hut Australia highlights the simple building style and large timbers. It also shows a timber fireplace and chimney. Strutt also sketched a New Zealand settler's "whorry" in 1856. William Swainson, John Barr Clark Hoyte, Frances Mary Hodges, and Charles Blomfield painted slab wharves and other structures.
Nicholas Chevalier's painting Buffalo Ranges shows a hut falling apart, supporting Louisa Meredith's idea that many hut owners did not maintain their homes well. Unk White's 1960s sketches of Tyrrell's Vineyard include a slab hut from 1858.
Australian cartoonists like Alex Gurney, Percy Leason, Stan Cross, and Eric Jolliffe often used slab huts as backgrounds for their funny drawings. Jolliffe also drew detailed sketches of old slab buildings to help preserve Australian history. In newspapers and magazines from the colonial era, illustrations of rural towns and farms often showed slab huts and homes.
A Modern Slab House
This slab-walled house (Fig. 1) was built in 1992 in the Watagan Mountains of New South Wales.
It is different from traditional designs in a few ways. It is raised off the ground on stumps (Fig. 5). The walls are made of sawn timber, not split flitches (Fig 2.). It uses the "nailed channel" method to hold the slabs, not grooves. The spaces between the slabs are filled with foam-rubber strips (Fig. 5). The house is not lined or covered (Fig. 3). It does not have a chimney or fireplace. The floor is made of chipboard.
Like traditional structures, the roof has no joists and no ceiling. The entire roof space forms the inside, which helps keep it cool in summer. The gable-ends (the triangular parts of the wall under the roof) are framed with studs and filled with weatherboards (Fig. 4). A mezzanine floor (a partial upper floor) keeps the walls square. This floor is reached by a spiral staircase, making the house effectively a two-storey building (Fig. 3).
Images for kids
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Slabs chamfered to fit bottom plate -
Saw-marks in corner post -
Battens nailed over gaps -
Fig. 2 -
Fig. 3 -
Fig. 4 -
Fig. 5
