Garchitorena's biological father, Buenaventura de Erquiaga Palacios (1895-1959), was a Spanish honorary vice consul, from
Ea,
Biscay. Garchitorena's mother, Flor Chereau Garchitorena (1902-1981), came from
Tigaon,
Camarines Sur, and was of Spanish and French descent. Flor's brother was Don
Mariano Garchitorena, governor of Camarines Sur, secretary of Agriculture and commerce, and Minister to Spain. Garchitorena was the grandson by paternal line of Felipe Santiago de Erquiaga de Odiaga (1859-?) and María Jesús Palacios Goitia (1858-?), and by maternal line of Don
Andrés Garchitorena, a revolutionary mason and member of Aguinaldo's Hong Kong Junta, and of Marguerite Chereau, who was French. ==Illness and death==