 She formed part of the British naval contingent involved in relieving the Peking legations during the Boxer Rebellion in 1900 and surveyed the north channel of the Yangtze prior to the battleship 's navigation of the river.In 1902 Lieutenant and Commander Ernest Clifford Hardy was in command, and she was in Hong Kong in October that year.Socotra Rock was surveyed by "Waterwitch" confirming a depth of less than , and she met severe gales in the Formosa Channel in 1903, and lost three men overboard.