In Singapore on 4 August, the ship received orders to escort the troop ships "Frankfurt" and "Wittekind" to Tsingtao, the capital of the German Kiautschou Bay concession in China. The three ships arrived there on 13 August, and four days later, "Vizeadmiral" ("VAdm"—Vice Admiral) Emil Felix von Bendemann, the commander of the East Asia Squadron, transferred his flag from the protected cruiser to "Fürst Bismarck". At the time, in addition to "Hertha", the squadron consisted of the protected cruisers , , and and the unprotected cruisers and , the latter having arrived in the region just days before "Fürst Bismarck". Not long after "Fürst Bismarck" reached Hong Kong, the Detached Division, which consisted of the four pre-dreadnought battleships of the and the aviso arrived with additional troop ships. The squadron was further reinforced over the following month with the cruisers , , and , the gunboats and , the torpedo boats , , and , and the hospital ship "Gera". German forces contributed 24 warships and 17,000 soldiers to the Eight Nation Alliance, which assembled 250 warships and 70,000 soldiers in total to combat the Boxers. An agreement with Russia saw the German "Generalfeldmarshall" (Field Marshal) Alfred von Waldersee placed in command of the multinational force.