Her sister Sarah, born March 20, 1811, married, April 17, 1834, Vester Vassall, and died in May, 1874. At the outbreak of the war both the children of this marriage were living. The younger son Irving, died April 9, 1865. The elder son, Bernard Barton Vassall, born October 10, 1835, married, October 26, 1863, Frances Maria Childs, and died March 23, 1894. Mrs. Vassall is still living. With this family Clara’s relations were those of peculiar intimacy. Her sister and her sister’s children were very dear to her. Irving was a young man of fine Christian character, not physically strong enough to bear arms, and was in Washington in the service of the Government during the war. Bernard married Clara’s dear friend and assistant at Bordentown. He was a soldier and during the war his wife Fannie lived for a considerable time in Washington. Clara Barton’s mother, Sarah or Sally Stone, born November 13, 1783, died July 10, 1851, aged sixty-eight. Her death occurred while Clara was studying at Clinton, and the expressions of solitude in Clara’s diary at the time of her perplexities over her love affairs, were induced in part, though perhaps unconsciously, by her loneliness after her mother’s death. Clara’s relations to her father were always those of peculiar nearness and sympathy. In her childhood he was more constantly her companion than her mother ever was. When Clara was away from home, nothing more surely gave her concern than news from her brother or sister that “father,” or from her nieces and nephews that “grandpa,” was not as well as usual. Her diaries and her letters are burdened with her solicitude for him. In the latter part of 1861 his health gave occasion for some concern, but he seemed to recover. She made a journey to Worcester and Oxford in December, but returned to Washington before Christmas, taking with her boxes and trunks of provisions for the soldiers which she wished to deliver if possible at Arlington, so as to be closer to the place of actual need. Her nephew, Irving Vassall, was with her on the return journey. The letter which preserves the account of this expedition is interesting as recording her account of a Sunday spent with the army. What took her there was her determination to deliver her goods to the place of need before she returned to her home in Washington. She was still learning military manners and the ways of camp life, and was giving herself unsparingly to the collection of supplies. She was assisting in hospital work in Washington, and definitely planning to have a hospital there assigned to herself. As yet, apparently, she had no definite plan to go herself directly to the battle-field.