The Children's Overseas Reception Board (CORB) was a British government sponsored organisation. The CORB evacuated 2,664 British children from England, so that they would escape the imminent threat of German invasion and the risk of enemy bombing in World War II. This was during a critical period in British history, between July and September 1940, when the Battle of Britain was raging, and German invasion forces were being amassed across the English Channel.

SS Duchess of York was one of a class of four steam turbine ocean liners built in Glasgow in 1927–29 for Canadian Pacific Steamships Ltd's transatlantic service between Britain and Canada.