Between 2000 and 2001, excavations revealed five stone structures, including several vernacular cottages with remarkably preserved features such as drystone walls, clay floors, and cobbled areas. The cottages, measuring roughly 15 metres by 5 metres, were built with undressed stone bonded with clay and featured practical elements like fireplace embrasures and internal divisions. Structure 1 even retained a fine chimney embrasure, whilst Structure 4 had a well-constructed fireplace in its northern gable, though its walls survived only to a single course.

The largest discovery was an 18-metre-long building at the northern end of Rough Point, complete with multiple internal walls that suggested a more complex domestic or communal use. Intriguingly, one of its walls appeared to have been constructed atop a dump containing 17th-century pottery sherds, providing crucial dating evidence for the site. The pottery assemblage, though modest at fewer than 200 sherds, consistently pointed to the 1600s, aligning perfectly with historical maps and documents that identify this as part of Killybegs’ original Plantation settlement.

These structures, with their ‘lazy-bed’ agricultural ridges and boundary walls, paint a vivid picture of early colonial life in Ulster. The settlement’s inhabitants would have been among the first wave of English and Scottish settlers brought to Ireland during the Plantation of Ulster, living in these simple but sturdy homes whilst establishing new agricultural practices on the rocky peninsula. Today, nothing visible remains above ground; the entire settlement was excavated ahead of modern pier development, but the archaeological record preserves this snapshot of a pivotal moment in Irish history when new communities were taking root in the western shores of Donegal.