The Esmeralda was developed as a custom-design by naval architect Philip Watts for the Chilean Navy. On 18 December 1907 she brought troops from Valparaíso to Iquique to repress thousands of miners from different nitrate mines in Chile's north to appeal for government intervention to improve their living and working conditions. It became the Santa María School massacre. Esmeralda served in the Chilean Navy for approximately thirty years, until 1930.