 "Breslau" was one of the seven ships of the "Köln" class of ships built for the Bremen to Baltimore and Galveston route.Interned at New Orleans, Louisiana at the outbreak of World War I, "Breslau" was seized in 1917 by the United States after her entry into the war and commissioned into the Navy as USS "Bridgeport".Originally slated to be a repair ship, she was reclassified as a destroyer tender the following year.