John Stufflebean, Patriot ancestor of David and Michael Stufflebean, was born to Palatine German immigrant parents about 1752 on the east side of the Hudson River near Albany, NY. About 1775 or 1776, he was living near the Pennsylvania-New Jersey border at Neversink, Sullivan County, NY, when he enlisted under the service of Captain James Dewitt as a private in the Pennsylvania line for two years. He was stationed at Hackensack, New Winston and Paramus, NJ, along with other small towns. About two years later, his company was sent to spy in and guard the neighborhood of the Delaware River in NY from the Indians. He was captured by Colonel Joseph Brant, chief of the Mohawks, and the Tories. The prisoners sailed up the Delaware on longs and rafts, crossed the Susquehanna River and finally reached the Mohawk camp about 20 miles from Niagara Falls. While there, John and the other prisoners were forced to run the gauntlet. After about eight months, he was sold by the Indians to the British. He was then imprisoned at Detroit for about two years until he and five others escaped captivity by sailing one hundred miles or more along the Detroit River waterways, through wilderness to the Muskingum River in Ohio. There they fell in with James Garrard's company to Kentucky, where he remained until the close of the war.

John married first to Elizabeth Ross and secondly, in the fall of 1792 or 1793 at Paris, Bourbon County, Kentucky to Elsee Larrison Ketchum, the widow of Joseph Ketchum. John and Elsee had ten children, including son Michael, ancestor of Compatriots David and Michael Stufflebean. John and Elsee remained in Kentucky until 1842, when they removed to Kaskaskia, Randolph County, Illinois to live with their son, Jacob. John died there on 16 January 1844. His name is on a bronze marker on the grounds of Sparta High School, in Sparta, Illinois, placed by Fort Chartres Chapter DAR in 1934.