Shotgun

Long rectangular dwellings, one room wide and generally one story tall. They can be two stories in what is called a Camelback, with a second story in the back. Believed to be first built in the U.S. in Louisiana by free Haitians because of the compact lot size required, the shotgun house design may have been brought to Louisville by French fur traders and possibly first built in Shippingport.

Louisville’s surviving shotguns were built after the end of the Civil War, and mainly between 1890 and 1915. Louisville now has the largest collection of Shotgun houses in the entire country, only after Hurricane Katrina devastated New Orleans. They are a special and unique vernacular architecture to Louisville.

Shotguns are found in many of Louisville’s neighborhoods such as Portland, Germantown, Butchertown, Russell, California, and the older sections of the Highlands.

Shotgun houses are among the most common late 19th century and early 20th century house types in the urban South.