As the Benares started to go down for good, each lifeboat and the surviving passengers were engaged in their own struggle. Colin’s boat was in danger of being sucked down with the sinking ship, and the crew aboard was frantically paddling with their hands to move the lifeboat farther away. Bess was still clinging to the keel of her overturned boat, but she noticed Beth Cummings climbing up the other side of the boat. She helped pull her friend up, and they held on opposite one another. Lifeboat 12, with Mary Cornish, six CORB boys, over 30 lascars, the sick Father Rory O’Sullivan, and a handful of sailors, was dryer and more comfortable than most other boats. On board, Fred Steels could see dead bodies in the water all around them. He could also see a light on the sinking Benares; Captain Nicole planned to go down with his ship and was spending his last moments looking out for his crew and passengers. As Fred watched, the ship slid the rest of the way into the ocean and vanished.

From her lifeboat, Barbara Bech also watched the Benares sink. She wondered if her mother and siblings were safe. She had a gut feeling they were okay; if she were watching them drown on the ship, she was sure she would feel something. In fact, Barbara’s family was safe on their raft and also watching the ship sink. Derek and Sonia lamented the loss of “[a]ll that ice cream” (137). As the ship went down, it emitted “a terrible noise, like a groan” (137), as if the ship’s soul was crying out.

The Benares was gone, and now the surviving passengers and crew had to survive “the tyranny of the high waves, the wind, the rain, the hail, the bitter cold” (137).

The Bechs’ raft was made for only three people, but five clung to the raft’s slats. The waves made the raft feel “like a bucking bronco” (138), and the passengers had to hold on tight, even though it pinched their fingers. Mrs. Bech’s fingers were soon bleeding, and she lay on top of little Derek to keep him from falling off. The raft was not built for the rough seas it was faced with, and “it was already starting to break apart” (140). Derek was also in danger because, after being seasick all day, his empty stomach made him more susceptible to the cold. His mother continued lying on top of him, despite the discomfort, and shouted at him to wake up whenever he drifted off to sleep. After hours of holding on, little Sonia began to tire. At one point, she fell asleep and slipped into the ocean. She woke up underwater, feeling at peace with the knowledge that she had drowned. The sailor on their raft, however, pulled her out and back onto the raft. Again, Sonia fell asleep, and again, she was pulled out of the water. As the sun began to rise, Mrs. Bech saw that the raft was all alone in the vast ocean, and she began to lose hope. She told her daughter they should “take off [their] life jackets and go to sleep in the ocean” (152).

Colin’s lifeboat was also in bad shape, full of water and barely floating. People in the boat were beginning to die from exposure as the cold air and water lowered their body temperature until their organs began to shut down. Colin was lucky; he was relatively warm with his coat and special lifejacket, and he even discovered his mother had put some gloves in the jacket’s pocket. Colin did his best to help where he could, trying to comfort the increasingly “cold and terrified” nurse who sat beside him (141), and helping to push dead bodies into the sea as passengers succumbed to the cold. Adults on the ship had always considered Colin mature, but now “he was heroic” (141). He kept holding the nurse, comforting her, and for a while, he didn’t even notice that she had died in his arms.

Jack Keely was shivering uncontrollably on his raft with Eric Davis, shoeless in only his pajamas and lifejacket. However, he didn’t complain. He and Eric tied themselves to the raft and found some food in a cupboard. They ate a dry ship’s biscuit and drank a tin of condensed milk, all while riding through waves that Eric estimated to be 20 feet high. The third man on the raft was the second engineer, John McGlashan. He had been injured in the evacuation and now lay on the raft without speaking. Jack began to drift off to sleep, but he woke just in time to see McGlashan rolling into the water. He shouted to Eric, who managed to pull the unconscious man back, saving his life.

Clinging to the keel of their overturned boat, Bess and Beth had a good chance of surviving. They were both “big, strong girls” (145), which would help them stave off exposure. However, they would also need “determination, guts, and smarts” (145). They looked at one another and promised to hold on. One by one, hands began to release the keel. Soon, only Bess, Beth, and a lascar were left. Just when Bess thought things couldn’t get any worse, a huge wave threw their little boat into the air. They held on as their bodies were slammed back against the boat. It happened over and over again, and they struggled to hold on.

By dawn, the remaining survivors were beginning to lose heart. Mrs. Bech “was desperate and exhausted and in terrible pain” (154). She wanted to take off her life vest and let herself drown, but her daughter, Sonia, shouted at her that this was a “terrible idea” and insisted that rescue was on its way.

Bess and Beth were also exhausted. Bess was ready to let go and try swimming, but Beth insisted that she couldn’t swim; she was determined to keep holding on, so Bess did, too. They kept promising one another that they wouldn’t give up, but their bodies were starting to give out, and there was still no sign of rescue.

The survivors were also starting to hallucinate. They thought they saw giant fish, or platters of food, but most often they believed they saw ships coming to their rescue. When Sonia Bech shouted that she saw a red sail, it wasn’t a hallucination but a real boat, a lifeboat from the SS Marina, which had been torpedoed after the Benares. The lifeboat’s skipper had seen the raft in the night and was intending to bring its occupants aboard, a stroke of good luck, since the raft wouldn’t last much longer in the rough seas. The Bechs and the raft’s other two passengers were so stiff from holding on all night that they had to be carried aboard the lifeboat, but once safely situated, they were given some biscuits and condensed milk, and they perked up considerably.

The mood in lifeboat 12 was hopeful. The boat was dry, and all six of the rescued CORB boys were still alive. They knew that Benares had put out an SOS and help was on the way, but the lifeboat’s skipper, Ronnie Cooker, and his right-hand man, George Purvis, decided to ration the boat’s supplies, just in case. They carefully portioned food and water and distributed it to the passengers.

The HMS Hurricane had been sailing all night toward the site where the Benares went down, but its speed was impacted by the storm. By morning, the storm had abated some, and the captain, Hugh Crofton Simms, was able to sail faster. He knew that time was of the essence to save as many survivors as possible, but he didn’t know just how much the passengers of the City of Benares had suffered in the night, how many had already died, and how many were now teetering on the brink of death.

Simms knew the lifeboats would have drifted apart from one another, so he and his navigator devised a grid of 20 miles surrounding the Benares’ last known position. They would navigate through the grid one square at a time to search for survivors and send out a small rowboat called a whaler if the larger destroyer could not approach the smaller lifeboats and rafts.

By 1 pm, the Hurricane had reached the vicinity of the sinking of the Benares. Captain Simms blew his horn to announce the ship’s arrival and began scouring the sea for survivors. The first craft they spotted was the Marina’s lifeboat carrying the Bechs and other Benares survivors. The Hurricane’s crew was “thrilled” that there were children on board to rescue, and they made a line of sailors to pass the children up a rope net and onto the destroyer. It made Sonia feel “like a wet sack” (167). Once aboard, they were given baths, clean clothes, and something to eat. It felt “heavenly,” but Mrs. Bech was still worried about Barbara, her eldest daughter.

The Hurricane crew was emboldened by this successful rescue, but as the afternoon crawled on, no more lifeboats were spotted. Some of the survivors were at risk of spending another night on the open ocean.

Many of the remaining survivors, including Bess, Beth, Jack, and Colin, were “in terrible shape” (170). They were bruised, dehydrated, freezing, and “beyond pain.” They needed rescue to come as soon as possible. Jack Keely’s raft was holding together, but his little body was starting to give out. Eric Davis noticed that Jack was talking less and became “truly alarmed” when the boy asked, “How do you stop these things when you want to get off?” (171). Finally, late in the afternoon, they heard a sound that even roused the semi-conscious McGlashan. When they crested a wave, they were able to see the Hurricane coming toward them. The rescue attempt was complicated, but Jack and the two men were successfully brought aboard the destroyer. After the ordeal, Eric Davis “was full of admiration for Jack Keeley” (176) and praised the boy’s “bravery,” “politeness,” and determination to survive.

The crew of the Hurricane found more bodies as they continued their search, and their morale began to wane. As the sun sank ever lower, the need to find survivors became more urgent. Bess, Beth, and the surviving lascar had spent more than 19 hours clinging to the keel of their overturned lifeboat. They had been hallucinating all afternoon, but this time, Bess was sure she saw a real ship. Her lips were “so encrusted with salt and swollen” that she could barely speak, and when she managed to say the word “ship,” Beth didn’t believe her at first (177). The Hurricane was overjoyed to spot the survivors, but their rescue would be delicate. They sent the whaler out to the girls, but their fingers were so cramped and swollen, they could not let go of the keel. One of the sailors had to pry Bess’s fingers off one by one, peeling her skin off with them and leaving her fingers “shredded and bleeding” (179). Once in the boat, all three survivors were unconscious, and the sailors rowed back, unsure if they would live.

As the ship’s doctor attended to Bess, Beth, and the lascar, the Hurricane set off toward another lifeboat. However, as they approached, they discovered that everyone aboard was dead.

Colin Ryder Richardson had been waiting in his lifeboat, waist-deep in water, for over 20 hours. When he saw the Hurricane coming toward him, he didn’t believe what he was seeing at first. Soon, however, he and the other passengers realized their rescue was finally coming, and they began to sing. Colin was frozen in place from the hours of sitting, so crew members carried him aboard and into the engine room, where he began to warm up. The ordeal would change Colin forever, but he was lucky to be alive.

Most of the rescued survivors fell asleep once they were safe. But some, like Mrs. Bech and Bess, were worried about other family members who had also been on the ship. With each new batch of survivors brought on board, Mrs. Bech asked for Barbara, but her daughter was nowhere to be found.