The first USS Amphion was a former German passenger liner SS Köln for Norddeutscher Lloyd from 1899–1917. Köln had been interned in Boston on the outbreak of war in Europe and confiscated in April 1917 when the United States entered the war. The ship was under the control of the United States Shipping Board (USSB) that allocated commercial type ships to military or civilian use during the war. Köln was renamed Amphion and operated by USSB for the Army as United States Army Chartered Transport (U.S.A.C.T.) Amphion as an animal transport taking mules, horses and general cargo to forces in Europe. At the end of the war the USSB allocated the ship to the Navy, which used the ship from April to September 1919 as a troop transport for returning the United States Expeditionary Force from Europe. The USSB contracted for the refurbishment of the ship after return by the Navy but the glut of war built ships, many new, resulted in Amphion lying idle from 1920 until sold for scrap in January 1924. Norddeutscher Lloyd Köln Köln was built in 1899 by J. C. Teckenborg A. G., Geestemünde, Germany, for Norddeutscher Lloyd. The ship, signal letters QGTJ, was a , twin screw, awning deck type vessel of lighter construction in which the upper deck was not a full deck but a light covering deck above the main deck. There were two full decks. The ship was intended for the line's Baltimore and Galveston trade with limited cabin class accommodation and concentration on steerage passenger and cargo space. The ship was launched 24 July 1899 and placed in service 20 October 1899 on a voyage from Bremen to Galveston and on 21 December on initial service to Baltimore. Registry information shows 4,666 Net tonnage, registry length of , breadth and depth of . USSB data after the war shows loaded draft as with and summer . Navy shows draft aft as with a overall length. There were six holds with six hatches, the largest by , served by seventeen booms, and ten winches of five ton capacity each. Two double ended and two single ended, a total of six, Scotch boilers provided steam to two triple expansion engines. The ship was configured to carry 120 second class and 1,850 third class passengers and in addition to Baltimore and Galveston made voyages to Boston, Montreal, New Orleans, New York, Philadelphia, and