Just finished reading Notes of a Russian Sniper by Vassili Zaitsev and was stunned at a bit of information in appendix one, which is a translation of a 1943 published account given to Red Army reporters shortly before Zaitsev temporarily lost his sight due to shrapnel.

It takes two seconds to take a shot, and the SVT rifle has a ten-round magazine.  The moment you press the trigger, it loads itself and throws out a cartridge case.

Here I always thought they were using 91-30 sniper variants, and they had (I presume) SVT-40’s.  Looking for further info on a quick google search one is overrun with 91-30 data.  Any interesting resources that speak to the work of the SVT-40 during the siege of Stalingrad?

Production of the SVT was much higher than many realize.  Something on the order of 2 million.

"The SVT 40 sniper rifle become the standard issue snipers weapon in the summer of 1940. The Soviet Unioun was the 1st nation to officially adopt a semi automatic snipers rifle and it served throughout the war despite being wirthdrawn as the primary snipers rifle in October of 1942."

The Sniper Rifles Of The Red Star

Probably due to AARs gathered from the Winter War the Red Army decided to go with a semi auto platform for its sniper rifle. The SVT-40 was supposed to have wide circulation, 1/3 of all rifleman were supposed to be armed with them instead of Mosin Nagants. But the rifle had some issues that took some time to resolve and that made fielding limited, they ended up stopping production in late '42. Considering the short distance that most urban sniping takes place (under 300 meters) and that field modifications were possible to maintain acceptable levels of accuracy, I can see why SVT sniper rifles were used.

The SVTs were withdrawn from the sniping role due to shooting first round flyers from a cold bore, correct? This is a trait common to tilting bolt rifles- FN FAL and -49, et al...