If you are hiking near Erbie, you may come upon a cemetery with comb graves. These are graves covered by rectangular sandstone slabs leaning together to form a gable roof.
These are the tombs of John and Sarah (Cooper) Adair, two early Newton County pioneers. They moved from Knoxville, Tennessee, to Northwest Arkansas just a few years before Newton County was created.
In The Newton County Family History, descendant Artie Adair said that they started their journey west by oxcart to the Mississippi River. They then went on barge and raft on the Mississippi and Arkansas Rivers to a point near Van Buren, Arkansas. From there they traveled by oxcart through the Boston Mountains to the Buffalo River near Kingston.
They followed the Buffalo River to a good place near a bubbling spring, where they built a log cabin. The place they settled is called Erbie, and the Adair cemetery is near where the old cabin stood.
John Adair's tombstone is engraved with a circle surrounding a plow, mattock, shovel and hatchet. In the center of the circle is a hand pointing upward. Around the circle is the epitaph "Rest for the Weary."
Barbara LeRoy is the author of “Which Side Were They On?,” a new 302 page book listing biographical sketches of the Newton Countians who were involved in the Civil War, available for sale either in the Bradley House Museum or by purchasing online at www.newtoncountyar.com. The book sells for $33.
