Built with oil-fired boilers from the outset, she was placed on the London to Ramsgate service.
Designed to pass under London Bridge, Crested Eagle had a telescopic funnel, hinged mast and squat structure, which enabled her to use Old Swan Pier.
She was switched to the East Anglian coast service (London-Southend-Clacton-Felixstowe) in 1932, and was known as the "Greyhound of the River" according to a General Steam postcard of her Captain and she sailed the Essex and Kent coasts, as well as to Felixstowe.
Crested Eagle went to Sheerness after initial London evacuation work at the beginning of World War II.
She was bombed and sunk at Dunkirk on 28th May 1940 shortly after leaving Dunkirk after her first crossing to evacuate allied troops, the bomb hitting between the funnel and the engine room. As she sank, her fuel oil ignited and the blaze that followed claimed over 300 lives.
Her hulk still lies on the Dunkirk beaches.