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He was a brave man, who did not lead from the rear. He was shot or nicked several times, including three bullets to the leg, wrist, and shoulder at Antietam.

The real irony is that Sedgwick was right: the Confederates almost certainly could not hit an elephant at that range, and he was killed by a round that was either not intended for him, or was blind luck.

People claim the snipers were about 1000 yards away, but careful measurements taken by the NPS place the actual distance at about 550 yards.

You'll get varying opinions about how accurate snipers and their rifles were in those days, but most agree that 300 yards was about the limit of complete surety range for weapons used by Confederates at Spotsylvania, with 500-700 yards being a 1/4 proposition, and 1000 yards being about 1/10. [It gets heated on the Civil War message boards, with some people saying that using black powder and the packing methods of the day, and no spotters, anything over 400 yards was a complete crapshoot, to others who say Civil War snipers hit 700 yards all the time...]

Add to that, Sedgwick was moving up and down the line, so he was not stationary, and you should probably conclude it was a very lucky shot.

The function of the sharpshooters in that case was to postpone effective deployment as long as possible, and not necessarily to kill a Union general. Obviously they'd accept that as a bonus.