# Compeyson — Great Expectations character guide

> Compeyson in Great Expectations by Charles Dickens.

**Role:** supporting

**Also known as:** Ware Compeyson

**First appearance:** 0003-iv

## Snapshot

A polished swindler whose charm hides a coward's heart, he ruined Miss Havisham and turned Magwitch into a lifelong enemy.

## Who they are

Compeyson moves through the criminal underworld with a gentleman's manners and a forger's cunning, bending weaker men like Magwitch into his service through debt and fear. When his accomplice Arthur raves about a vengeful woman in white, Compeyson speaks boldly but never draws near the sickroom himself — a telling glimpse of the coward beneath the polish. His shadow falls across the entire story: he is the reason Miss Havisham stopped her clocks and the reason Magwitch was transported, making him the hidden hinge on which Pip's fortune and Estella's coldness both turn.

## In the story

### [Chapter III](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/great_expectations_se/chapters/iii)

The second convict, mistaken by Pip for the first, is encountered on the marshes and flees into the mist.

### [XLII](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/great_expectations_se/chapters/xlii)

Described as a smooth, gentlemanly criminal who betrayed Magwitch and was Miss Havisham's lover.

### [XLV](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/great_expectations_se/chapters/xlv)

Compeyson is mentioned as a man of bad character; Pip asks Wemmick about him and learns he is alive and in London.

### [Chapter L](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/great_expectations_se/chapters/l)

Mentioned as the evil genius who used knowledge of Magwitch's past to keep him poor and working hard.

## Links

- HTML: https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/great_expectations_se/characters/compeyson
- Book: https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/great_expectations_se
- All characters: https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/great_expectations_se/characters