Local tradition holds that St. Patrick himself founded this sacred ground, which occupies a prime spot on gently sloping land overlooking Lough Foyle to the east. The site centres on a sub-rectangular graveyard that has served the community for well over a millennium, with its entrance marked by an imposing ringed high cross standing nearly three metres tall.

Within the graveyard walls, visitors can explore the ruins of two medieval churches, one of which served as the parish church during the Middle Ages. The site’s most intriguing structure is undoubtedly the mortuary house, known locally as the ‘Skull House’, a tomb-shrine that speaks to the site’s importance as a place of pilgrimage and veneration. Scattered throughout the graveyard are numerous carved stones, including cross-slabs, a small basin stone that may be a bullaun (used for grinding or holding holy water), and various cross-inscribed markers that chronicle centuries of devotion and commemoration.

Recent conservation work has revealed the site’s hidden treasures, with a 2010 clean-up scheme uncovering seven previously unknown medieval cross-slabs and a carved stone figure. Among the more unusual finds was half of a circular millstone, complete with its central perforation, which appears to have been repurposed as a grave marker near the Skull House. This practical reuse of the millstone, likely from a nearby mill that has since vanished, exemplifies how sacred and secular life intertwined in medieval Ireland. The Cooley Cross Heritage Committee has carefully documented these discoveries, ensuring that this ancient site continues to reveal its secrets to those interested in Ireland’s ecclesiastical past.