1,500 Mourn Marine From Duarte

With her son’s casket before her and a huge American flag hanging high above the altar, Martha Martinez stood strong Saturday in front of a packed church crowd and told mourners what overwhelmed her heart:

“I am a mother with a broken heart,” she said. “I had so much love for my son and I feel so sad that I have lost him.... But I will always be proud of him.”

As a 30-member choir sang hymns of peace and resurrection and six uniformed Marines carried his flag-draped casket, about 1,500 people filled Immaculate Conception Church in Monrovia and then overflowed onto the sidewalks during the funeral Mass for Pfc. Francisco A. Martinez Flores, the Duarte Marine killed in Iraq when his tank plunged into the Euphrates River on March 25.

The 21-year-old was remembered as someone who loved two countries, Mexico and the United States, and gave his life, his mother said, “to free a country that did not have peace.”

“Despite what people say that this war is about business or is about oil,” she said, “I know that my son went to Iraq for liberty and to end suffering.”

Flores, who wore a long American flag scarf around her neck and a large button imprinted with a photo of her son in uniform, recalled how “Panchito,” as his family called him, wept on the phone with her the day he left for Iraq.

She said she could not give him a final embrace because she was in Mexico attending her father’s funeral the day he left Twentynine Palms.

“He was my firstborn son and the pride of this family,” she said as many in the pews began to weep. “I will always remember him as a young man with so much spirit.”

Martinez Flores came with his family from the Mexican state of Jalisco at age 3 and was two weeks away from becoming a U.S. citizen when he died, one of thousands of green card soldiers who volunteer for military service. His relatives proudly said Saturday that he had been posthumously awarded citizenship.

Leslie Flores, his cousin, spoke about how their friendship transcended childhood and grew into a strong adult relationship.

“Sometimes people say you don’t know what you have until you lose it. But I knew,” Flores said. “Panchito used to make me laugh until my stomach hurt.... I knew him as a naughty boy and then a strong man.”

At one point, both of the Marine’s parents rose from their seats and stood by the casket, which was draped in a solid white cloth symbolizing his ascent to heaven.

“On behalf of our country and the world, we thank you for giving us your son, this hero,” a family friend said as the crowd erupted in a long applause.

After the Mass, mourners assembled in front of the church to begin a mile-long processional walk to Live Oak Memorial Park. As church bells resonated through the neighborhood, a Monrovia Fire Department truck slowly led the procession, followed by the hearse and eight Marines marching solemnly in unison to the beat of a single drum.

Three women carried a red banner that read “Forever Our Hero”; following them was a two-block-long expanse of mourners.

Along Monrovia’s Walnut Street and then California Avenue, residents came out of their homes and quietly looked on as the procession passed. A group of teenagers playing basketball stopped their game and placed their hands over their hearts. About 15 residents gathered on one corner holding high an American flag while several drivers pulled over, got out of their cars and folded their hands as if in prayer.

At least 20 flags flanked the cemetery roadway and, as Marine pallbearers carried the casket to the gravesite, a mariachi group softly serenaded the crowd. “We commend his body to the earth, Lord,” said Father Charles Ramirez. “May he sleep here in peace.”

As the mariachis sang Adios, Adios, several male family members, including Martinez Flores’ 11-year-old brother, Sammy, delicately placed a shovelful of dirt over the lowered casket.

Marisela Campos, 21, Martinez Flores’ fiance, said the memories of their happy times have comforted her in the weeks since his death.

“He kept God in his life and heart, and I know he is in a better place now,” she said. “We were planning to be married when he got back, but God wanted something different.”