Distinguished by its two-tiered gallery extending across a remarkably long façade, the William Barnett House in Montgomery County is an amalgamation of additions built around a log core. The two-story log section is of undetermined age; local tradition places it as early as 1813. A 1937 Works Progress Administration of Virginia Historical Inventory claims it dates from 1850, the year the property was purchased by the Barnett family. Regardless of age, the William Barnett House is interesting as a demonstration of the regional practice, seen especially in towns, of extending a building parallel to its road frontage. The house may have been increased in size as many as five times, but is unified by its continuous gable roof and the late-19th-century sawn-work railing. With three early outbuildings, the William Barnett House preserves considerable information on the way a homeplace evolved in the idiom of an area’s vernacular tradition.

The William Barnett House was listed in the registers under the Prehistoric and Historic Resources of Montgomery County MPD.