text: The Shrine of St. Richard had, up to this point, enjoyed a level of popularity approaching that accorded to Thomas Becket at Canterbury. The document ordering the destruction of the shrine was issued to a Sir William Goring of Burton and a William Ernley. They received £40 for carrying out the commission on 20 December 1538.
  One of the royal commissioners for the destruction of St. Richard's Shrine, William Ernley, was associated with the parish of West Wittering in Sussex. Someone from there, it seems, may have spirited away the relics and bones of St. Richard and hidden them in their own parish church. It is here that local tradition holds remains of the saint are to be found:
  The Lady Chapel not only contains the Saxon Cross but also an ancient broken marble slab engraved with a Bishop's pastoral staff and a Greek cross believed to have come from a reliquary containing the relics of St. Richard of Chichester, a 13th century bishop who often visited West Wittering. Part of his story is shown in the beautiful red, white and gold altar frontal presented by Yvonne Rusbridge in 1976. On the left St Richard is shown feeding the hungry in Cakeham and on the right leading his followers from the church, his candle miraculously alight despite the gust of wind which blew out all the other candles.
  Extract from the description of the parish church of St Peter and St Paul, West Wittering.