Johann Philipp Stiehl, son of Heinrich Stiehl of Bierstadt/Wiesbaden, married on 31 October 1758 in Trais-Horloff, northwest of Nidda, to Anna Catharina Raab, daughter of Johannes Raab & Anna Margaretha Grothe. She had been born there on 6 February 1742.
They had three known children: (1) Johann Ludwig, born 26 November 1759; (2) Johann Friedrich, born 8 June 1762; and (3) Johann Henrich, born 18 March 1764.
They immigrated to Russia, arriving from Lübeck at the port in Oranienbaum on 22 July 1766 aboard the pink Lev under the command of Lieutenant Fyodor Fyodorov. Only two of the boys survived the trip to Oranienbaum. Johann Friedrich is not recorded on the ship.
Both parents and the youngest son, Johann Henrich, died during the journey between Oranienbaum and Saratov. Orphaned Johann Ludwig arrived in Grimm and is recorded there on the 1767 Census in Household No. 3 living with the Johannes Lipp family.
On the 1775 Census of Grimm, he is still living with the Lipp family in Household No. 97. By the time of the 1798 Census, he is recorded in his own household (No. Gm143) in Grimm.
- Mai, Brent Alan. 1798 Census of the German Colonies along the Volga: Economy, Population, and Agriculture (Lincoln, NE: American Historical Society of Germans from Russia, 1999).
- Müller, Hanno. Familienbuch Trais-Horloff, Inheiden, Utphe, Kreis Giessen (Darmstadt: Hessische Familiengeschichtliche Vereinigung, 1997): 461.
- Pleve, Igor. Einwanderung in das Wolgagebiet, 1764-1767 Band 2 (Göttingen: Göttinger Arbeitskreis, 2001): 73.
- Pleve, Igor. Lists of Colonists to Russia in 1766: Reports by Ivan Kulberg (Saratov: Saratov State Technical University, 2010): doc. no. 2315.