Miracles on the Water: The Heroic Survivors of a World War II U-Boat Attack

In September 1940, ninety lucky English children were placed aboard the S.S. City of Benares by their parents, bound from Liverpool to Canada. They were pioneers in a program designed to spirit British children from their war-ravaged homes to safer shores. But they had no way of knowing that in the darkness of September 17, a German U-boat would sink their ship, tossing them and the other 316 people on board into a rough, gale-driven sea. How any of them survived is a miracle. Journalist Tom Nagorski’s stirring account, based on interviews with survivors including his own great-uncle, brings their saga to light for the first time.