Melissa J Hobart

COLUMBIA, S.C. — The mother of a South Carolina woman who died in the war in Iraq says she wants her 3-year-old granddaughter to know her mother didn’t just abandon her.

Army Pfc. Melissa Hobart, 22, of Ladson, died Sunday in Baghdad after collapsing while on guard duty, the Defense Department said. She was the second South Carolina woman to die in the war in Iraq.

Hobart’s mother, Constance, was distraught over her daughter’s death. She was concerned about her granddaughter, who she has helped raise.

“She always says, ‘My mommy’s in the Army fighting bad people.’ I don’t want her to think that she didn’t come, that she just left her....