After Sailor's Creek both armies knew the end was near

Generals on both sides were aware that the war in Virginia was coming to an end after the string of mishaps along Little Sailor's Creek. As his army fell apart at Marshall's Crossroads, General Robert E. Lee said to General William Mahone, "My God! The army has it disbanded?" Lee warned President Jefferson Davis in a letter that "a few more Sailor's Creeks and it will all be over," emphasizing the magnitude of the catastrophe.

The never-bashful General Philip Sheridan of the Union army informed General-in-Chief Ulysses S. Grant of his victory. Little Phil predicted that Lee would submit if the issue was pressed. When President Lincoln learned of Sheridan's report, he said, "Let the thing be pressed." Grant wrote to Lee the following morning, April 7, starting a conversation that resulted in Lee's capitulation on April 9.