 Marlborough joined the group of battleships battering the German light cruiser SMS Wiesbaden at 18 : 25 . She fired five salvos , before a premature detonation in the right barrel of " A " turret disabled the gun . She also engaged the ship with her secondary battery . At 18 : 39 , Marlborough again engaged what appeared to be a Kaiser @-@ class ship , firing a salvo before the German vessel disappeared into the haze . During the engagement with Wiesbaden , the German cruiser launched one or two torpedoes at around 18 : 45 , one of which struck Marlborough around the starboard diesel generator room . The detonation tore a 28 @-@ foot ( 8 @.@ 5 m ) hole in the hull and causing significant flooding , that forced the forward boilers on that side of the ship to be <unk> and reduced the ship 's speed to 16 knots ( 30 km / h ; 18 mph ) . Burney initially reported to Jellicoe that his ship had struck a mine or had been hit by a torpedo at 18 : 57 . Several more torpedoes , this time from the torpedo boat SMS <unk> , forced Marlborough and the rest of the ships in her division to take <unk> action . 
