A comprehensive, systematic archeological survey was conducted at GEWA. Forty-one sites were documented as the result of the fieldwork, including 32 previously unrecorded sites. Eight of the nine previously identified sites were found to cover larger areas and/or contain more components than had been indicated on existing site records. In all cases, the present survey gathered information that augmented existing records and contributed to more reliable interpretations of site age and type.

Initial work included an overview and assessment of previous archeological work at the park, development of the prehistoric and historical contexts, and assessment of the environmental context

The primary survey methodology was systematic shovel testing at 15 m intervals in all areas of the park covered by vegetation, and systematic surface inspection of all exposed areas, including four plowed fields. The results indicated that human occupation of GEWA began at least as early as the Late Archaic period (ca. 5000-3200 BP). Such occupations, characterized as occasional, short term camping episodes by small groups of hunter-gatherers continued with regularity until English colonization of Virginia in the early seventeenth century.

Although many of the historical archeological resources had been previously recorded as archeological sites, or at least recognized as such by NPS staff, at least six sites with historic components were found that had not previously been identified. Among these are late seventeenth-/early eighteenth century domestic farmstead occupations and possible eighteenth-and/or nineteenth century tenant farmer or slave occupations. Further, previously unidentified activity and/or structural loci were found on the periphery of the major colonial era sites that had been previously studied and excavated.