SMS Dandolo was the second and final member of the Erzherzog Friedrich class of screw corvettes built for the Austrian Navy in the 1850s.

[1] At the same time, tensions between Austria and the Kingdom of Sardinia rose significantly, prompting the Austrian government to order the fleet to mobilize in February to be prepared for an attack by the Royal Sardinian Navy.

They did not sortie to attach the French or Sardinian naval forces, and the war ended quickly after the defeats at Magenta and Solferino in June.

[2] Already in late 1862, the head of the Austrian Navy, Archduke Ferdinand Max, offered the sale Dandolo and several other wooden ships in an attempt to acquire funds to build a fleet of ironclad warships, though the proposal came to nothing.

Dandolo remained there through 1866, and was not recalled when the Third Italian War of Independence broke out in June; as a result, she was the only modern Austrian warship not present at the Battle of Lissa.

The ship then conducted shooting practice off Fasana before returning to Pola to make preparations for a longer voyage to South America.

Over the following months, the ship toured several ports along the eastern coast of South America, including Rio de Janeiro, Brazil; Buenos Aires, Argentina; and Montevideo, Uruguay, among others.

Dandolo departed from Montevideo on 13 March and crossed the Atlantic to Simon's Bay, South Africa, arriving on 12 April.

She later moved to Port Elizabeth, where on 5 May, a heavy storm broke two of the ship's anchor chains, and she was forced to steam at full power to avoid being blown aground.

[6] During the Franco-Prussian War, the Kingdom of Italy began to make preparations to seize the Papal States, most significantly Rome.

By 3 September, the French had been decisively defeated at the Battle of Sedan, which convinced Franz Joseph to abandon the issue, since he was unwilling to go to war to prevent the Italian annexation of Rome.

Dandolo initially left Naples in company with Kerka, but the two vessels separated when the latter required towing from Habsburg to transit the Strait of Messina.

[8] By September, Dandolo had returned to the active squadron, which consisted of the same vessels as it had in 1870, with the exception of the gunboat Velebich replacing Helgoland.

After passing Tarifa and entering the Atlantic, Dandolo encountered severe storms on 23 March that caused minor damage to her rigging and slowed progress north.

The ship sailed back south to Gravesend, where she participated in celebrations marking the birthday of Queen Victoria on 1 June.

In late December, Dandolo and Zrinyi were ordered to sail to the eastern Mediterranean to patrol the Aegean Sea and the coast of Ottoman Syria and Egypt.

The ship arrived in Piraeus on 6 February, and over the following months, visited several ports in the region, including Salamis, Salonika, Syros, Souda, and Santorini.

The voyage began on 29 June and saw the ship visit ports in Italy, including Messina in mid-July and Naples later that month.

Vice Admiral Enrico Di Brocchetti, the commander of naval forces in Naples, came aboard Dandolo to thank the crew for their assistance.