Marine Cpl. Theodore A. Bowling

Died November 11, 2004 Serving During Operation Iraqi Freedom

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25, of Casselberry, Fla.; assigned to 3rd Battalion, 1st Marine Regiment, 1st Marine Division, I Marine Expeditionary Force, Camp Pendleton, Calif.; killed Nov. 11 by enemy action in Anbar province, Iraq.

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Florida Marine reported killed in Iraq

Associated Press

MIAMI — Another Marine from Florida was added Friday to the combat death toll in Iraq’s Anbar province, the fourth servicemen from the state to die there this week.

Cpl. Theodore A. Bowling, 25, died Thursday in the province that includes the city of Fallujah.

He had nearly finished his second tour in Iraq and expected to return home to central Florida in a few weeks and get married and become a police officer.

Bowling was the third Marine from Florida killed in that area this week, the Pentagon said. A Navy hospital corpsman from Jacksonville, serving with a Marine combat unit, was also killed there.

Bowling was born in Miami and raised in Casselberry, just northeast of Orlando. He graduated from Lake Howell High School in 1997.

He was seven months into his second tour in Iraq and last talked to friends and family two weeks ago to say they wouldn’t be hearing him for a while, but he would return home soon.

“He was telling me to buy a plane ticket (to meet him at Camp Pendleton, Calif., when he returned),” said girlfriend Patricia Kirby, 24.

Bowling had said he wanted to become a police officer and would start pursing it when he came home. He was assigned to the 3rd Battalion, 1st Marine Regiment, 1st Marine Expeditionary Force, based at Camp Pendleton, Calif.