In 1944, William Golding was a Lieutenant in the British Royal Navy, and in the early months of that year, he assumed command of the rocket ship LCT (R)460. Much of Golding’s writing on his experiences during the Second World War is unpublished, although novels like Lord of the Flies and Free Fall are clearly inspired by them. As the allied forces began waiting for D-Day, Golding recorded some thoughts in a notebook, which still survives to this day. In May, he was given a brief period of leave to see his wife Ann and son David, and he wrote of the visit in his notebook:
‘Yes it was a good place: so good a place, so happy a thirty hours that I must not think about them lest the walls of my cabin crush me, and hurt.’
D-Day was scheduled for 5th June, but poor weather delayed the operation until the 6th. Golding’s ship’s landing zone was Gold Beach, and John Carey writes that ‘the landing […] went well’. Their objectives included capturing Bayeux and making contact with the American forces at Omaha Beach. Golding later told David that he had to cross a minefield in order to ‘catch up with the D-Day invasion fleet’ (Carey, 102). After D-Day, Golding would go on to command a rocket ship at the Battle of Walcheren in October.
In 1961, Golding wrote an essay, ‘The English Channel’ for Holiday magazine, also now available in his collection The Hot Gates. He describes flying over the English Channel and envisioning the fleet of thousands of ships en route to the landings:
‘Indeed the Channel was big that night, oceanic, and covered with a swarm of red stars from planes and gliders moving south. I found that we were miles west of our position. So we turned southeast and steamed at full speed all night over jet black waves that were showered with sparks of phosphorescence and possibly loaded with mines.
I stood there all night catching up and felt history in my hands as hard and heavy as a brick.’