William Swinton, Campaigns of the Army of the Potomac

On the following day, September 2d, the army was, by order of General Halleck, drawn back within the lines of Washington, and Lee, abandoning direct pursuit, began to turn his eyes towards the north of the Potomac.

Within the fortifications of Washington the army now rested from the labors, fatigues, and privations of this trying campaign, in which, from the Rapidan to the front of the capital, it had fought and retreated, and retreated and fought. It had passed through an experience calculated to dislocate the structure of most armies; and if it reached the lines of Washington in any military order whatsoever, it was because the individual patriotism of the rank and file supplied a bond of cohesion when the bond of military discipline failed. Of the losses in killed and wounded during this campaign, no official record is found; but the Confederate commander claims the capture of nine thousand prisoners, thirty pieces of artillery, and upwards of twenty thousand stands of arms in the engagement on the plains of Manassas alone. Untold thousands had straggled from their commands during the retreat.

As for Pope, it is hardly possible to feel for him less than pity, in spite of the bombastic pretensions with which he set out. The record already given does not justify the assertion that he was not obeyed by his subordinates; but it cannot be denied that the estimate of his character held by the officers under his command was not of a kind to elicit that hearty and zealous co-operation needed for the effective conduct of great military operations. He had the misfortune to be of all men the most disbelieved. General Pope took the first opportunity on his return to Washington to vacate the command; the Army of Virginia passed out of existence, and its corps, united with the Army of the Potomac, fell back into the arms of McClellan.