It is all that remains of a structure known to antiquarians as the eastern hut, a small dwelling of entirely unknown date that sits slightly apart from three companion huts, nineteen metres to their north-northeast and noticeably lower on the slope. The western arc of the enclosure has already been lost to erosion, and the cliff edge continues to press closer. What survives is nonetheless surprisingly legible: a subcircular bank, fern-covered in summer, that measures just under five metres along its longer axis and rises to about 0.65 metres above the ground outside and 0.7 metres above the flat interior at its southern end. No entrance can be identified with any confidence; a narrow gap on the east-southeast side is more likely the product of generations of foot traffic than any original feature.

The hut forms part of Doonallia, a promontory fort occupying a headland on the island. A promontory fort uses the natural advantages of a coastal spur, cutting off the landward approach with an earthwork or wall and relying on the sea cliffs to defend the remaining sides. Doonallia follows this pattern, and the cluster of hut sites on its platform suggests it was once a place of some domestic or communal activity, though precisely when remains open. The antiquarian Thomas Johnson Westropp visited and recorded the site in the early twentieth century, noting this particular structure in publications from 1911 and 1914, where he identified it simply as the eastern hut among the group. His observations remain among the earliest systematic descriptions of the Doonallia complex, and the broad outlines of what he saw are still visible on the ground today, minus the portion the cliff has since claimed.