Stone Gardens: A pioneering farmer from Tennesee helped to establish an early Logan County Community

Allison Gardner Lile

Allison Gardner Lile was born on May 5, 1830, in Fayette County, Tennessee. He grew up in a region of cotton farms and expanding settlements

. By the late 1850s, he had moved to Arkansas, drawn by available land in the Arkansas River Valley.

On December 4, 1858, in Lafayette County, he married Martha Elizabeth Waldrip, born in 1832. The couple started their family during a period of growing tension leading to the Civil War.

No records show Allison serving in the military, and like many civilians, he focused on farming and family during and after the conflict.

The Liles moved several times in the early years. The 1860 census lists them in Lafayette County with their infant son Henry. By 1870, they had returned briefly to Fayette County, Tennessee, possibly due to post-war conditions or family needs. They soon relocated permanently to Logan County, which had been formed in 1871 (first as Sarber County, renamed Logan in 1875).

Allison worked as a farmer, appearing in censuses from 1880 to 1910 in rural townships such as Ellsworth and near Subiaco. The area attracted settlers from Tennessee and neighboring states, using routes like the Military Road built in 1835.

Allison and Martha raised at least four sons: Henry Allison (1859–1934), Albert Forrest (1873–1930), Samuel Nelson (1875–1932), and William Brunson (1879–1924). The children spent much of their lives in or near Logan County. Henry farmed in Prairie View and Subiaco, married Amanda Haggard, and raised a large family there before dying in Paris in 1934.

Albert lived and farmed in the Paris area with wife Lena Catherine Tyler, dying in 1930. Samuel later moved to Fort Smith in adjacent Sebastian County, where he died in 1932. William stayed in Ellsworth Township as a farmer and died in 1924. Records sometimes spell the surname as Lyle, a common variation in frontier documents.

Most of the family remained in western Arkansas, with some later descendants moving to places like Oklahoma.

Martha died in 1896. In 1899 (or possibly 1898), Allison married Mrs. L.A. (Louise) Butler, a widow.

This marriage connected the Liles to the Butler family, early settlers in the Subiaco area. The Butlers had arrived in Logan County in the 1870s or earlier, farming along the Military Road. Though there was no formal town called Butler, the name referred to a loose cluster of farms and families

.

.Butler Cemetery, a small rural graveyard near Subiaco with fewer than 50 marked graves, serves as the final resting place for both families. It includes William Butler (1829–1896), Tabitha Franklin Butler (1832–1900), Louise Butler (died 1911), Allison Lile, Martha Lile, and son William Brunson Lyle.

The cemetery, now overgrown and abandoned, dates to the late 19th century and reflects the interconnected lives of pioneer families in the region.

Allison died on August 19, 1913, at age 83, and was buried in Butler Cemetery. His life spanned major changes in American history, from antebellum Tennessee to early 20th-century Arkansas.

The Liles and Butlers were part of Logan County's broader pioneer settlement: families who arrived after Native American removals, took advantage of land grants, and rebuilt after the Civil War.

They contributed to the area's farming economy and small communities, leaving a legacy preserved in local records, censuses, and the quiet graves of Butler Cemetery.