Bahia was the lead ship of a two-vessel class of cruisers built for Brazil by the British company Armstrong Whitworth. In November 1910, just six months after her commissioning, crewmen aboard Bahia, Marechal Deodoro, Minas Geraes, and São Paulo mutinied, beginning the Revolta da Chibata (Revolt of the Lash). During the four-day rebellion, Brazil's capital city of Rio de Janeiro was held hostage by the possibility of a naval bombardment, leading the government to give in to the rebel demands, which included the abolition of flogging in the navy. During the First World War, Bahia and her sister ship Rio Grande do Sul were assigned to the Divisão Naval em Operações de Guerra (Naval Division in War Operations), the Brazilian Navy's main contribution in that conflict.