Life is strange. I was only checking for responses to my query when I happened to see THOMAS in your query. I clicked it only on impulse since my Thomas line was never in Macon County. Imagine my surprise in seeing the name of my gg grandfather David Thomas, and possible gggg grandmother Racheal Thomas. I say possible because this has been put forward by one researcher but has been not been confirmed to my satisfaction.
You have a pretty little mystery here that I find intreguing since I have not seen this census. I can tell you a great deal about the Thomas's, but I'm afraid I haven't found any connection to the Ledbetter's, not that there couldn't be one of course.
What I can tell you is that Racheal was the wife of John Thomas Jr. who died in 1820. David would have been her grandson if researchers are correct. His fathers name was also John.
According to all reports I have it goes this way; John Sr. b. circa 1750 m. in SC; John Jr. b. 1770 SC; John b. 1792 SC.; at some point all moved to Buncombe Co. NC where David was born 1817 mother, name unknown, apparently died giving birth. John remarried in Buncombe Co. The family moved to Habersham Co. Ga. around 1827. The area in which they lived became Union Co, Gilmer Co.,and Fannin Co., successively as new counties were formed. You can find Racheal Thomas in the Fannin County Census of 1860 living in the Sallie Godfrey household. I ran a quick check and found no Ledbetter's living in Fannin in 1860.
The point of all this is that if Elleander Thomas Ledbetter was related to David it would have been mearly as a cousin by way of John Sr. or John Jr.. I don't have complete lists of family members for them. As to why these people were living with the Ledbetter's? My guess is that being a relatively young couple just starting out, they were probably taking in boarders to make ends meet. I can tell you that David married DAISY DODSON the year following the 1850 Gilmer census. If you have any questions or need something from my files, you may contact me. I should have more info on the Thomas's coming soon from a new contact.
I hope I haven't muddied the waters even more for you.