HMS "Otranto" was an armed merchant cruiser requisitioned by the British Admiralty when World War I began in 1914. Built before the war for the UK–Australia run as SS "Otranto", she was primarily used in the war to search for German commerce raiders. She played small roles in the Battle of Coronel in November 1914 when the German East Asia Squadron destroyed the British squadron searching for it and in the Battle of the Falklands the following month when a British squadron annihilated the Germans in turn.