Bremse saw relatively little activity through her career, spending most of her time in the reserve fleet. In 1891, 1893, and 1902, she was commissioned to serve as a fisheries protection vessel in the North Sea. In those years, she also visited Britain, and in 1893, she was present for a naval review in Kiel, Germany. She was struck from the naval register in 1903 and converted into a storage hulk. Later, she was modified to serve as a floating fuel oil storage tank. She was sold into civilian service in 1910; her ultimate fate is unknown.
See main article: Brummer-class gunboat.
The two s were ordered in the early 1880s as a follow-on to the eleven s that had been built in the late 1870s, which were intended to serve as part of an integrated coastal defense system, supporting the four s. The Wespes had proved to be controversial vessels, owing to their slow speed, tendency to roll badly, which were caused by excessive weight, particularly the very large gun they carried. As a result, the Brummer class carried a smaller gun and dispensed with the heavy belt armor used in the Wespes They also introduced new compound armor, rather than the old, heavy wrought iron used in the earlier vessels.
Bremse was 64.8m (212.6feet) long overall, with a beam of and a draft of . She displaced 867lk=onNaNlk=on as designed and at full load. The ship's crew varied over the course of her career, consisting of 3–5 officers and 62–73 enlisted men. She was powered by a pair of double-expansion steam engines that drove single 4-bladed screw propeller, with steam provided by two coal-fired cylindrical fire-tube boilers, which gave her a top speed of 15.2kn at 2081PS. At a cruising speed of, she could steam for 1370nmi.
The ship was armed with a main battery that consisted of a single K L/30 built-up gun in an open barbette mount forward. This was supported by a single K L/24 built-up gun and two Hotchkiss revolver cannon. She was also armed with a torpedo tube submerged in her bow. Bremse was protected by a compound armor deck that was thick. The barbette for the main battery was thick compound steel, backed with of teak planking.
Bremse was built at the AG Weser shipyard in Bremen; she was laid down in 1883. She was launched on 29 May 1884. After fitting out work was completed later that year, and she was moved to the German: [[Kaiserliche Werft Wilhelmshaven|Kaiserliche Werft]] (Imperial Shipyard) in Wilhelmshaven to have her armament installed. She was commissioned on 22 December to begin sea trials, which lasted until 23 January 1885. Bremse was thereafter decommissioned and placed in reserve for the next five years. The ship was recommissioned on 17 March 1891, under the command of German: [[Korvettenkapitän]] (KK—Corvette Captain) Gottlieb Becker. The ship was used to patrol fishing grounds in the German Bight. On 27 August, she sailed around Denmark to join the main fleet in Kiel for the annual fleet training exercises. Bremse returned to Wilhelmshaven on 18 September and resumed fishery protection duties until 11 November. During this period, she cruised as far as the Dogger Bank in the North Sea, and from 12 to 17 October, she visited Hull, Britain. She stopped in Harwich, Britain, from 24 to 30 October. She was decommissioned in Wilhelmshaven for the winter months on 19 November.
The ship was recommissioned again on 15 March 1893 and resumed fishery protection patrols in the North Sea; this time, she was commanded by KK Hans Meyer. This was interrupted on 15 March, when she once again made the voyage around Denmark to participate in a naval review in Kiel held in honor of the visit of Tsar Alexander III of Russia. By 18 June, she had returned to the North Sea for fishery protection duties. Bremse joined the fleet for the annual maneuvers that began on 16 August in the western Baltic Sea. She then returned to Wilhelmshaven, where she was decommissioned again on 30 September. Bremse spent nearly the next decade in the reserve fleet.
Bremse returned to service for the third and final time on 2 April 1902, once again to serve as a fishery protection ship. That year, she operated alongside the aviso in the North Sea During this period, she visited several German and British ports. From 7 to 13 May, she made a visit to Kiel. The next three months passed uneventfully, and on 29 August, she was decommissioned for the last time in Wilhelmshaven. She was struck from the naval register on 10 March 1903 and was converted into a storage hulk, and later as a fuel oil barge. She was sold to a company in Düsseldorf in 1910 for use as a barge. Her ultimate fate is unknown.