The ship was ordered as part of a program to strengthen Prussia's coastal defense forces, then oriented against neighboring Denmark.

The Jäger class of gunboats came about as a result of a program to strengthen the Prussian Navy in the late 1850s in the aftermath of the dissolution of the Reichsflotte and in the midst of rising tensions with Denmark.

Named after the crocodile, the ship was completed later that year, and after conducting her initial sea trials in the fall of 1860, she was moved to Stralsund before being laid up on the island of Dänholm.

On 8 December 1863, the Prussian Navy ordered the fleet to mobilize, as tensions between Prussia and Denmark over the Schleswig–Holstein question rose sharply.

Temporary repairs to the hull were made to allow her to be mobilized for use as a floating battery to defend Stralsund in the event of a Danish amphibious assault, which did not materialize.