RMS Adriatic was a British ocean liner of the White Star Line. She was the fourth of a quartet of ships of more than , dubbed The Big Four. The ship was the only one of the four which was never the world's largest ship. However, she was the largest, the fastest, and the most luxurious of the Big Four, being the first ocean liner to have an indoor swimming pool and a Turkish bath. She began her career on the brand new route from Southampton to New York before joining, from 1911, her sister ships on the secondary route from Liverpool. They were in fact slow liners intended to provide a service at moderate prices. When World War I broke out, the Adriatic was among the ships that continued their civilian transatlantic service, while carrying many provisions. In 1917, she was requisitioned and served as a troop transport. After the war, she was refitted several times, and was gradually used for cruises, which became her main services in the 1930s. When Cunard Line and White Star Line merged in 1934, she was quickly deemed unnecessary and sold at the end of the year. She was scrapped in Osaka in 1935. Conception and construction At the end of the 19th century, White Star Line, under the leadership of Thomas Henry Ismay, changed its policy to embark on the construction of ships which no longer sought to dominate in the area of speed, but to transport passengers en masse and regularly on spacious and comfortable liners. This resulted in the commissioning of the Big Four, four large, moderate-speed liners ordered at the start of the new century. The first, the Celtic, entered service in 1901, followed by the Cedric in 1903 and the Baltic in 1904. The fourth ship in the series, the Adriatic, was ordered from Harland and Wolff shipyards in Belfast in December 1903, but she wasn't completed until May 1907, a strangely long delay. This delay could be explained by the fact that the shipyards were building the Amerika at the same time, with a similar profile. Harland and Wolff built Adriatic on slipway number three of its North Yard in Belfast, Ireland. To continue to own the largest ships in the world, White Star had asked the shipyards to enlarge the Baltic during its construction; the ship measured nearly 3,000 tons more than its predecessor, but it