[4] Her brothers-in-law included Hiram Berdan, an officer for the Union Army and an inventor and Vice President Levi P.
[5] The couple lived for four years in Valparaíso, Chile, where Joseph, a banker, managed his company's interests there.
[5] Hobson became interested in social welfare and proper nursing education through Louisa Lee Schuyler.
[5] Hobson wrote a report about the need for proper training, standard practices, and professionalism of nurses for the State Charities Aid Association.
[5] After studying the plight of African American women in five states, she recommended the establishment by the John F. Slater Fund of the Southern Industrial Classes in Norfolk, Virginia that taught cooking, sewing, and first aid.
[5] Hobson lived in Washington, D.C. and Bar Harbor, Maine and wrote the book Recollections of a Happy Life.
She was good friends of President Theodore and Edith Roosevelt, and her home was "one of the few private houses where they meet in an informal way".
A service was held for her at Grace Church in Manhattan, New York City and was buried in a family plot at Green-Wood Cemetery in Brooklyn.