It helps to have specific counties in South Carolina, Tennessee and Alabama to concentrate my search - James Jeffries has been very elusive person to track down. Are you aware of any Billions/Billings that might have been in Indiana or Ohio?

I have a subscription to the newspapers at Ancestry and checked the entry for Littleton Billions. There is a Littleton Island in the area and it happened to be on a page with the word "billions".

The Greene County library has a good collection of newspaper notices and there wasn't an obituary for Ruth in their files. I suspect the only reason I was able to find estate papers for her is that she owned a small bit of land which had to be sold at her death.