The ferry Waterwitch was built at the Fairfield Shipyards in Glasgow in 1914, on behalf of the Ottoman Empire (now modern Turkey). She was originally named the Resit Pasa.
Owing to the outbreak of World War One, the British Government refused to export the ship, and she was used instead as a troopship, serving the allied forces who were fighting the Turks at Gallipoli.
The main British base for the evacuation of Gallipoli was Mudros harbour on the island of Limnos, and there Waterwitch was used to ferry troops, including the 3CLY, from the harbour to the larger ships which would take them to Alexandria in Egypt.