Our Best – Lt. Bergan Flannigan
1st Lt Bergan Flannigan of Tupper Lake wears the Purple Heart she was awarded after losing her leg while on patrol last month in Afghanistan. Shown with her at Craig Joint Theater Hospital in Afghanistan are her husband, 1st Lt. Thomas Flannigan, left, and Col. John F. Garrity. Army photo
Tupper Lake is a small upstate New York community in the heart of the Adirondack Mountains. The drive to this community proceeds through paths where the sky is blocked out by the mountains on either side of the road. It is perhaps one of the most beautiful regions of the United States.
Industry is scarce in Tupper Lake and many jobs involve tourism and winter sports such as skiing. About 4,500 people live in the village. The local “central” school has 600 students in grades 7-12 and 600 in the elementary grades.
Twins Bergan and Bethany Arsenault graduated from the high school in 2004. Bergan chose to attend one of the top military academies in the country, Norwich University, where she met her future husband, Tom Flannigan.
Tom and Bergan Flannigan in Afghanistan
Her call sign is Spartan 6. His is Warlord 5.
Bergan and Thomas Flannigan met at Norwich University, a military school in Northfield, Vt. As a sophomore, he served as corporal in her freshman platoon. Their flirtation started the following summer, when he was at airborne school.
They married in 2007, just before her senior year, by which time Thomas was already commissioned as a second lieutenant.
Thomas, a 25-year-old from Topsham, Vt., is now the executive officer, the No. 2, in the 293rd MP Co. He’s slender and quiet, with a tuft of sandy-brown hair and close-shaved temples.
Bergan, 24, from Tupper Lake, N.Y., commands the company’s 38 person-strong Spartan Platoon, which patrols commercial neighborhoods in central Kandahar. In front of her soldiers, Thomas refers to his wife as the “P.L.”—platoon leader—or the “Six,” since unit commanders are always given that code number in radio communications.
On February 24, 2010, while on patrol, Lt. Bergan Flannigan was wounded by an IED blast. She lost part of her right leg and suffered other injuries. Flannigan is currently recovering at Walter Reed Army Hospital in Washington, D.C. Her parents are there to be with her and her husband has had his orders changed so that he can be with her, as well.
The people of Tupper Lake are conducting fund raisers to provide for the family.
Bergan Fund
PO Box 1200
Tupper Lake, NY 12986
- Purple Heart presentation from YouTube
- Tupper Lake Facebook page
- Slideshow of pics from the presentation
- Boston Maggie’s coverage
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This entry was posted on Friday, March 12th, 2010 at 11:23 am and is filed under Military, Military, Our Best: Military Women. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.
