William Wynn Westcott

William Wynn Westcott, primarily referred to as Westcott (ウェストコット), was a Magician and one of the Three Founders of the Golden Dawn.

Appearance
In the vision shown to Kamijou Touma based on Aleister Crowley's past, Westcott was described as an elderly man wearing a tailored suit with a necktie.

Personality
Being of an older age, Westcott followed ways of thinking which might have been considered old-fashioned at the time of the Golden Dawn. In disagreements with Mathers, he advocated traditions and the need to compromise over Mathers' desire to progress even if it meant entering areas considered heretical. Westcott was intent on maintaining his social standing and wanted his cabal to have history with an academic or royal scholar, which led him to forge a letter from Anna Sprengel to give the Golden Dawn more prestige.

Golden Age
In the latter half of the 19th century, William Wynn Westcott founded the Golden Dawn together with Samuel Liddell MacGregor Mathers and. Wishing to give to give the new cabal prestige, Westcott forged a letter, supposedly from a higher being called Anna Sprengel, in order to have a historical and prestigious background associated with the group.

Unlike Mathers, who never held down a worldly job, Westcott had a job as a coroner with. He was nearly fired when his association with the Golden Dawn was discovered and his superiors kept an eye on him afterwards, which meant he subsequently had to be careful when secretly attending to cabal affairs.

With Woodman retiring due to old age, control of the growing cabal was left between Mathers and Westcott. The two had conflicting views on how the cabal and magic should proceed, as the Golden Dawn worked towards the ultimate goal of discovering a unified theory to explain the truths of the world and constructing a magical work kit that brought endless possibilities for magicians. Being of an older age, Westcott advocated tradition and saw a need to compromise, while Mathers wished to see progress, even if it meant going into areas considered taboo and heretical at the time. Mathers in particular wanted his name to be the one associated with the products of the Golden Dawn's research. Eventually, the Golden Dawn eventually came to be divided between them, though neither faction had complete control over the organization as a whole.

When Mathers scouted Aleister Crowley for the Golden Dawn, Westcott was reluctant to have him join the cabal. His sentiments grew during a summoning ceremony which Aleister performed in front of the two founders, where Aleister's unconventional ideas and Mathers' intentions to use the man's talents for his own purposes were shown.

Downfall
After Aleister Crowley occupied 36 Blythe Road, the Golden Dawn's most important ceremonial ground and armory, ostensibly on Mathers' orders, a furious Westcott confronted Mathers at his headquarters, together with magicians from his faction. Mathers claimed that the document was forged and it was solely Aleister's doing, but couldn't say that the document was forged with the same method which Westcott used to forge a letter from Anna Sprengel, as Westcott was in front of his subordinates and wasn't in a position to openly accept it as doing so would compromise his own position.

A war subsequently broke out between the Mathers and Westcott factions of the Golden Dawn. While battles raged in the darkness of London, Aleister Crowley took advantage to attack members of both sides and plant evidence pointing to the other side. As the war escalated, further opportunities arose and eventually an opening emerged for Aleister to take out the founders. Westcott was attacked and struck down by Aleister using Blythe Road's Treasure, Imagine Breaker, with Mathers falling not long afterwards.

Return to England Arc
Though Westcott was thought to be dead, he somehow appeared alongside members of the Golden Dawn led by Mathers to confront Aleister Crowley in Westminster Abbey, having apparently survived.

Abilities
Westcott's magical ability was said to be not all that great compared to the likes of Samuel Liddell MacGregor Mathers and Aleister Crowley, however he still controlled a powerful faction in the Golden Dawn as one of its Three Founders.

This was in part due to possessing a form of quasi-immortality. He maintained this state by distorting the circulation of his life using the attraction of an extremely great being. When describing it, the recreated Mina Mathers omitted the exact details but mentioned Westcott's specialty in forging documents (having forged a letter from Anna Sprengel when creating the cabal to give it more prestige), his access to corpses as a coroner and how parchment was used to converse with demons and transfer souls. A red mass in the center of his chest apparently contained Westcott's soul. Though he never had doubts in it, this quasi-immortality didn't save him from death at the hands of Imagine Breaker.

Westcott also had medical experience and capabilities as a coroner of Scotland Yard. It can be assumed that Westcott has some degree of alchemical knowledge, being described by Mathers as having brought Alchemy back at the end of the 19th century.

Trivia

 * The real was a ceremonial magician and coroner who co-founded the  together with  and . He was later forced to cease his public association with the group due to its growing notoriety and his position as a Crown Coroner, though he secretly continued his involvement and would later be involved in one of its successor organizations, . He was also a chief of the . After retiring as a coroner in 1910, Westcott emigrated to South Africa in 1918, dying in Durban in 1925.