The first attempt by whites at settlement in present-day Randolph County came in 1752 or '53 when David Tygart — for whom the Tygart Valley River was named — and Robert Foyle (later called Files) located (separately) with their families in the vicinity of present-day Beverly. Although there had been no recent history of conflicts between whites and Indians in that immediate area, that summer a party of Indians traveling the Shawnee Trail discovered the Foyle cabin and killed seven members of the family. One son escaped and alerted the Tygart family, allowing all to escape. (The Tygart-Foyle settlements were the first white settlements attempted anywhere within the Monongahela River watershed in present-day West Virginia.) No other white settlement was attempted in present Randolph until 1772.