The Burning Tanker Adrift in the Atlantic

Arthur G. Hawkins is chief officer of the San Demetrio, a British merchant navy tanker loaded with thousands of tons of aviation spirit. An experienced deck officer, he is one of those civilians without uniform on whom the survival of the United Kingdom depends: fuel, food and ammunition cross the Atlantic in convoys, the favourite targets of the German raiders.

On 5 November 1940, convoy HX-84, which left Halifax with thirty-seven ships, is protected only by a single armed merchant cruiser, the Jervis Bay. The pocket battleship Admiral Scheer, infinitely more powerful, looms up. The Jervis Bay sacrifices itself to let the convoy scatter; it is sunk, but the majority of the cargo ships escape.

The San Demetrio takes several shells. The bridge is destroyed, the upper deck catches fire and a lookout is killed. With a cargo of petrol ready to explode, the order to abandon ship is given. Hawkins and fifteen men cram into a lifeboat and pull away into the freezing night.

Twenty-four hours later, after drifting without rescue, the boat sights the silhouette of a ship in flames. Drawing nearer, the sailors recognise, stupefied, their own tanker, still afloat and still ablaze.