The voyage of the SS City of Benares was meant to save children. Britain was under attack, and parents were being asked to make an almost impossible decision. Should they keep their children close while bombs fell around them, or send them across the Atlantic to safety? Some of their homes had been destroyed in the bombing as well. The Children’s Overseas Reception Board (CORB) had already helped thousands of children reach Canada and other countries without tragedy. There was every reason to hope these children would be among them.
She left Liverpool on Friday, September 13, 1940, with naval military escorts. On board were 406 people, including 90 children evacuated via the government’s CORB program to protect them from the Blitz. The first few days of the voyage were good ones, and the children were having an adventure. By September 17, the convoy reached a point roughly 250 miles west of Ireland. As planned, the destroyers assigned to the convoy detached to escort another convoy, leaving the merchant ships to continue on their own.
That night, a severe storm struck, causing heavy seas and gale-force winds. Out in the dark, the German submarine U-48 spotted the silhouette of the City of Benares. At 11:45 PM, a torpedo struck the ship’s stern. It struck right below where the children were sleeping, throwing them from their bunks into the freezing water rushing in. The children’s escorts risked their lives and went below to get as many as they could.
The Royal Navy destroyer HMS Hurricane arrived 24 hours later and pulled 105 shivering survivors from the water, but the vast majority of the children had already succumbed to hypothermia or drowning. In total, 258 people died, including 77 of the 90 CORB children. Now, Lifeboat 12, carrying Mary Cornish, Father Rory O’Sullivan, six of the CORB boys, and dozens of others, had drifted away from the main search area and was missed by the destroyer. For the next eight days, those aboard the lifeboat battled hunger, thirst, storms, and exhaustion before finally being spotted by an RAF flying boat and rescued by HMS Anthony.
While adrift in the Atlantic for eight days, Mary Cornish did what she knew how to do. After risking her own life by returning below decks to search for more children, Mary Cornish spent eight days adrift in Lifeboat 12 doing what she knew best. She comforted children. She kept them moving. She made up games. She gave frightened boys something to think about besides the endless sea around them. Sometimes courage doesn’t look dramatic. Sometimes it looks like a schoolteacher refusing to let children lose hope. After they were found, she wasn’t seeking recognition. After the rescue, she was honored for her bravery, and Elspeth Huxley even wrote a book about her called Atlantic Ordeal: The Story of Mary Cornish. I have a few stories about the children, Mary, and other heroes on the companion page. They are worth checking out with one of the children earning a commendation for brave conduct.
It’s easy for us to say today that we would never have put our children on a ship crossing the Atlantic during wartime. But we know how the story ends. Those parents didn’t. They had already watched France fall. They saw London being bombed night after night and heard reports that Germany was preparing to invade Britain. Faced with those frightening realities, many believed sending their children overseas offered the best chance of keeping them safe. They didn’t know if Britain would even survive.
The CORB program had already transported 2,664 British children overseas between July and September 1940. Most reached safety without the kind of disaster that struck the City of Benares. The City of Benares wasn’t just a tragedy for the families who lost children. It was also heartbreaking for the families whose children had already arrived safely in Canada and elsewhere through CORB. The program had been working. That success is precisely why other parents were willing to trust it. The government shut the program down after this event.
The German crew of U-48 reportedly did not learn until later that children had been aboard. Several crewmen were said to have expressed shock and regret. Some later accounts claim that their commander, Heinrich Bleichrodt, never fully recovered from the knowledge of what his torpedo had done. However, the extent of his personal remorse is difficult to know. Unlike the RMS Lusitania, there is no evidence that the City of Benares was carrying ammunition or other military cargo.
Most people have never heard of the City of Benares. They should. It reminds us that history is not only made by famous leaders and great battles. Sometimes it is written by ordinary parents trying to protect their children, and by ordinary people like Mary Cornish who refused to give up hope when everything around them was slipping away.
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Max, thanks for bringing us this story. This is new to me and one of the most heart wrenching things I have ever heard about as well. Especially so as I sit with my soon to be five year old grandson who is happily enjoying his blueberries and waffle. How lucky we are. I remember something about the CORB program here in Canada, but I don’t recall it being given it’s proper due.
Yes, we are lucky Randy. I had never heard of this or that program before. It’s such a shame because so many kids were helped through that. This one was the hardest one to write.
War creates unspeakable horrors and immense suffering, and it is just awful how these families were torn apart.
Thanks Jim…It’s a wonder they were as successful as they were getting kids across safely.
What a heartbreaking story, Max. I can’t imagine the anguish for the parent of those innocent angels; just think of the nightmares that inevitably followed them all their days.
If the creative gods are on my side, I have something new in mind for my follow up story …. fingers crossed! Catch you later, Max.
I know…I can’t believe I’d never heard of this before. Good luck!
Great story, Max, and completely new to me.
I have trouble with your statement, “It’s easy for us to say today that we would never have put our children on a ship crossing the Atlantic during wartime. ” Remember, the United States has not fought a war within the continental 48 states since the British. The situation in Britain was dismal, and that is an understatement. We really don’t know what we would do. And I hope we never find out.
I guess for the moment I am not purple…
(and people not following this blog will have no idea what I am talking about.)
lol…Arthur when you log in…just walk through setting up a blog…that way it will not change. You don’t have to post.
Thanks Arthur….yea some parents who were not in that situation might would think…why did you do that? But yea…you are right…we wouldn’t know what we would do.
Nah. This is more fun. After I posted here I went over to another blog (Bruce’s wonderful Weave a Web) and posted first as Anonymous and then as the Purple Goatee. I guess I am WordPress schizophrenic. I’ve been called worse. 🙂
lol…ok…hey I know both of your personalities….and you started out with another one.
very tragic indeed, and another one I’d never heard of. As usual , you did a good job of finding some heroes and mini-miracles in such an otherwise horrible story. How could they possibly survive 8 days in a lifeboat – they’d not even have any drinkable water, would they?
Good question…I just looked it up: They relied on an initial supply of 16 gallons of fresh water stocked in the lifeboat. To make it last through eight days adrift in the Atlantic, the officers enforced strict rationing of just two small servings 2.8 oz (roughly 85ml) per person each day.
That is awful.
The CORB and all of the others were heroic in all they did, this story hits especially hard because of the children-
This one Beth was the hardest one I wrote. I’m glad this one had its own hero’s as well…or it could have been worse….I agree with the CORB program.
So tragic. Why can’t we stop having wars?
This one was the hardest one to write. I’m glad they stopped the program but also sad because it helped.
Mary Cornish…brave woman. I’m glad to learn about her. Good writing, Max.
Thank you so much Pam. Yes, she really was and what a daunting task, to spend 8 days in a lifeboat and with kids.
So heartbreaking.
Yes it was Dana…it was by far the hardest one to write. I’m happy there were people there and saved some anyway….and some sacrificed themselves to do it.
Had no idea. Isn’t war the shits?
Yes it is…I had never heard of this either.
Add this to the infinite list of reasons why war is a bad idea for all concerned. The “German response” is resoundingly underwhelming.
Yea, they tried to say there was ammo and all of that…nope…not this time. Mary Cornish now is one of my hero’s…geez. Eight days on a lifeboat with kids on top of everything else…I can’t imagine it. Thanks Lisa.
Adding insult on top of injury. :::gag::: The whole world needs to know about Mary Cornish <3
You're welcome, Max, good write-up on a horrific war story.
Max, for whatever reason I think it is baked into the human condition we have to have war. We’ve learned nothing after waging them forever. This is the kind of unintended consequences war brings. It is rarely just armies involved. Men, women, children, animals, wildlife, land…all victims as well.
Sadly, that is true Bruce. I just don’t know why I wasn’t taught this in school…the only bright spot were the passengers doing all they could to save the children’s lives.
War never has no winners, not on an individual level. So many heroic stories forgotten, so many lives disrupted or ruined, or lost. War- what the Hell is it good for? This is sad, this is demoralising, it tears us up, but in this two-bit instant gratification swipe-left Tik Tok type of world we live in now these bloody stories deserve to be looked at. More and more they need to be looked at. It’s a hard ol’ world come wartime, kiddies, it sure ain’t Disneyworld. Real lives, real people.
Anyway, keep up the great writing Max. It may make some uncomfortable, but sometimes that is the whole point. Because it needs saying.
Thank you obbverse…that means a lot. That’s what I’m finding out through all of these stories, these people are not stats…they are people. All these parents wanted was their kids to be safe. I’ve read remarks online that “there is no way I would let my kids on…” I’m like back up the truck…your house and life wasn’t just bombed out of existence.
Yep, I’ve got a book on the Blitz in London. The photographs say it more than the words. Gawd, what a literal Hell to live in. When your house, home and life is at the whim of a tumbling Luftwaffe bomb I think any parent would want to find a safe haven for their kids.
The biggest shame is that they had to stop it after this. It saved a lot of kids. I’m happy there wasn’t anything on that ship…not so much as a bullet from what I’ve read.
Like others have said here, it points out some of the real costs of war. The kindest thing I can say about politicians who brag they never saw a war they didn’t like should be transported to the nearest frontlines with missiles landing. As for the parents, I think they were heroes too…given the circumstances. Best to try to keep them safe and with as little psychological damage as possible. I assume there were plans to allow for the kids to be reunited with the parents, in the UK or Canada, after the war. But at that time, that could have been 6 months or 10 years.
https://theelephantstrunk.org/2026/08/08/ballad-of-the-lifeboat-ss-city-of-benares/