从第一到最后，波托马克的军队不幸。它战斗了四年，比美国历史上的任何军队都花费了更多的杀戮，而且它的运气始终出现。它做得最好，失去了。当赢得胜利时，胜利总是被一个强烈的束缚笼罩，终于胜利在Appomattox出现时，有很多人不在那里看到它。
(From first to last the Army of the Potomac was unlucky. It fought for four years, and it took more killing, proportionately, than any army in American history, and its luck was always out; it did its level best and lost; when it won the victory was always clouded by a might-have-been, and when at last the triumph came at Appomattox there were so very, very many of its men who weren't there to see it.)