Sumida was the first gunboat in the Imperial Japanese Navy inventory designed specifically for inland river service.

The need for such a vessel to operate on the rivers of the Asian mainland to protect Japanese commercial interests at various treaty ports had been perceived even before the Boxer Rebellion.

The Japanese government turned to the United Kingdom, and placed an order for such two such vessels in 1903: one the Sumida to John I. Thornycroft & Company and the other Fushimi to Yarrow Shipbuilders in Scotland.

Sumida was launched in June 1903, but was brought to Shanghai for final fitting out, but work was halted by official British neutrality in the Russo-Japanese War, the unfinished ship was impounded in until the end of that conflict.

Sumida continued to operate on the Yangtze River in China during the early 1930s, but was already considered obsolete, and was struck from the navy list on March 1, 1935.