The USS Reina Mercedes was a cruiser captured by the US Navy during the Spanish–American War. Th ship was named in honor of Queen Mercedes of Spain when she was built at Cartagena in 1887. The ship served under Admiral Cervera in the defense of Santiago, Cuba, although her boilers and engines were in very poor shape and much of her armament had been removed to be used from shore batteries. After an attempt to use her to block the channel was discovered, she was sunk by the USS Massachusetts and USS Texas.
Raised after the war, she was towed to Newport, Rhode Island where she served as a receiving ship. After a refit in 1912, she was transferred to Annapolis, Maryland to serve as a station ship, replacing the USS Hartford. Until 1940, one of the Reina Mercedes' roles was as a brig for the Naval Academy---cadets undergoing punishment were required to spend all time not in classes or at drills aboard the ship, sleeping in hammocks at night, for periods of up to two months. This practice was discontinued in 1940, to be replaced with confinement to rooms in Bancroft Hall. Other roles filled by the Reina Mercedes included service as a berthing barge for enlisted personnel assigned to the Academy during World War II, a lookout and harbor control center. It was a common joke at the time to refer to the Reina Mercedes as the "fastest ship in the fleet", since she was tied "fast" to the seawall.