Who is Lizzy from The Glory Field and what is their importance?

Lizzy is a slave on the Live Oaks plantation in South Carolina. When she is first introduced into the narrative, Lizzy is approximately fourteen years old and the Civil War is almost at an end. Lizzy is related to the Lewis family by marriage. When Lizzy is a much younger child, Old Master Lewis purchases Lizzy's mother from the owner of a rice plantation. There is some speculation as to exactly what Lizzy's mother dies of. Some believe it is a result of working in the rice fields in inordinately wet weather. Lizzy remembers that her mother was a "small woman"