S.S. Kronprinzessin Cecilie

SS Kronprinzessin Cecilie was an ocean liner constructed in Stettin, Germany (now Szczecin, Poland), in 1906 for North German Lloyd that had the biggest steam reciprocating machinery ever adapted to a ship. The last of four ships of the Kaiser set, she was also the last German liner to have been constructed with four funnels. On 4 August 1914, at sea after leaving New York, she turned around and put into Bar Harbor, Maine, where she later was interned by the neutral United States. After that country join the war in April 1917, the liner was capture and turned over to the United States Navy, and renamed USS Mount Vernon (ID-4508). While serving as a troop transport, Mount Vernon was torpedoed in September 1918. Though damaged, she was able to make port for repairs and returned to service. USAT Mount Vernon was sent to Vladivostok, Russia to ferry elements of the Czechoslovak Legion to Trieste, Italy and German prisoners of war to Hamburg, Germany. On return from that journey, enduring from March through July 1920, the liner was turned over to the United States Shipping Board and laid up at Solomons Island, Maryland until September 1940 when she was scrapped at Boston, Massachusetts.