There was quite a range in Appalachia: old, finely-made log cabins, coal company-built houses that were decently made but property of the Company, and brick houses in towns. Not everyone lived back in a holler. Perhaps at the bottom of the economic range was the Jenny Lind house, which was quite simple- a square of some light timbers were laid on some rocks, for the foundation , and the walls were boards stood on end, nailed onto that foundation and onto another frame running around the top..so there was no real structural framing with interior and exterior walls- just the boards. Often strips of wood, called battens, would be nailed across the gaps in the boards ( ergo the name "board and batten") so the wind wouldn't whistle through the house, but it was often not enough, so newspapers would be glued onto the interior walls, laid up like wallpaper, to help seal the place.

Goldenseal, the magazine put out by West Virginia Dept. of Culture and History, had a good article on the Jenny Lind house by Ken Sullivan in Spring of 1990, with photos of examples. A shorter description is here You might also just browse Goldenseal, if you can find a collection, and the old Foxfire books have a wealth of details as well.