SS City of Benares - Legacy

Legacy

In total, 260 of the 407 people on board were lost. This included the master, the commodore, three staff members, 121 crew members and 134 passengers. Out of the 134 passengers, 77 were child evacuees. Only 13 of the 90 child evacuee passengers embarked survived the sinking. The sinking was controversial, the Allied powers criticised the 'barbaric' actions of the Germans, and there was an outpouring of sympathy and support for those who had lost children in the sinking. The Germans defended the attack as being on a legitimate military target, and insisted that the British government was to blame for allowing children to travel on such ships in war zones when the German government had issued repeated warnings. They claimed that Baldwin-Webb and Olden were travelling to America with the aim of persuading the United States to enter the war, and that the City of Benares would be used to transport war materiel back to Britain on her return voyage.

The future of the CORB was already in question after the torpedoing of an evacuation ship, the SS Volendam, by U-60 two weeks earlier. 320 children had been aboard, but all had been rescued by other ships. The directors of the CORB were hopeful that the programme could be continued, and presented a report into the sinking which made recommendations for future operations, which included the use of faster transports and escorts on the North Atlantic routes, and the concentration of the evacuation programme on routes to Australia, India and South Africa, where the weather was better and there were felt to be fewer enemy submarines. The Admiralty pointed out that there were insufficient fast escorts and ships available, and public opinion was opposed to the continuation of overseas evacuation, fearing further tragedies. Winston Churchill also opposed the scheme, believing evacuations gave aid and comfort to the enemy. The government announced the cancellation of the CORB programme, and all children who were currently preparing to sail were ordered to disembark and return home. Though private evacuation efforts continued until their cessation in late 1941, official efforts came to a halt with the end of the CORB.

Bleichrodt was tried for war crimes related to the sinking of the City of Benares, after the war. He denied any prior knowledge of the presence of children, and refused to apologise for the sinking, stating his actions were within the bounds of military policy. Several historians have supported the contention that Bleichrodt was unaware of the presence of children, including Kate Tildesley, Curator at the Naval Historical Branch, Ministry of Defence who wrote 'What was not known by Bleichrodt was that the liner he was attacking carried 90 children ... Only 13 of the children survived, and the understanding that Bleichrodt could not have known which passengers were on board the liner made little difference to his perceived culpability.' Several of the crew of U-48, including the radio operator, later expressed their shock and regret once it became known that the ship they had sunk had been carrying children. They 'reaffirmed the German position that there was no way that the submarine could have known who was on board.'