St James' Church, Cooling was restored in the 19th century, when a vestry was added, and the porch was rebuilt. It was declared redundant on 19 November 1976 and vested in the Churches Conservation Trust on 31 May 1978. It is now cared for by a group known as the Friends of St James' Church. The church is open daily to visitors. The churchyard provided the inspiration for the opening chapter of Charles Dickens' book "Great Expectations", in which the hero of the story, Pip, meets the convict, Magwitch. In 2005 the musician Jools Holland married the sculptor Christabel McEwan in the church. St
Catherine Dickens daughter Kate, telling her to "Give these to the British Museum – that the world may know [Charles] loved me once" Catherine Dickens was buried in Highgate Cemetery in London with her infant daughter Dora, who had died in 1851 aged nearly 8 months. Catherine Dickens was the subject of the sixty-minute BBC Two documentary "Mrs Dickens' Family Christmas", broadcast on 30 December 2011 and performed and presented by Sue Perkins, and which looked at the marriage of Charles Dickens through the eyes of Catherine. In the 1976 series "Dickens of London" she was portrayed by Adrienne Burgess. In the