married Susan 25 Apr 1839

"The sole fact known of this Steffy's ancestry is that he was born in Virginia (per 1850-60-70 Census).  This brings to mind two unrelated families that moved to Indiana during the early 1830s: multiple branches of the Steffys of Wythe County who all moved to Knox County, and the elderly Philip & Elizabeth Stephy of New Market on the Rockingham / Shenandoah Co. borders who arrived in Clay Township of Wayne Co. in Nov. 1835 with the family of their daughter Dorothy Roof and almost certainly with their youngest child Phoebe Lyon and her family too.  The Knox County clan has no obvious links to William Steffy, as none of them moved to Vigo County nor did they have links to the family of William Steffy's wife.  In contrast, Philip Stephy had close dealings with William's father-in-law Jacob Richwine going back at least as far as 1799; they may well have known each other at Trinity Lutheran, New Holland back in Pennsylvania.  Furthermore, the Wayne-based estate of Jacob Richwine (d.1836) owed William Steffy money as of May 1841, thereby confirming William had lived in Wayne Co. prior to Vigo.  Thus, a plausible scenario is that William was on the Stephys' 1835 journey to Wayne Co., renewed his acquaintance with the Richwines, and then joined Samuel Richwine when in 1837 or 1838 Sam led 3 children from Jacob's second marriage (including William Steffy's future wife) in a move to far-off Vigo County; perhaps William did this to earn Susan Richwine's hand.  In short, this mysterious William Steffy might just be the youngest child of Philip Stephy (Memorial # 36595696).  However, this remains conjecture pending the discovery of conclusive evidence."

As of Dec. 2021 three entirely independent DNA matches have been identified between a descendant of Philip & Elizabeth Steffy and descendants of William Steffy of Vigo County, cMs 21, 18 and 9. While three is not a high number, it is remarkable that there are any matches at all, considering that William of Vigo has hardly any modern descendants, because his grandchildren and greatgrandchildren lived short lives with few children. Given the paucity of modern descendants available for matching, I feel three independent matches suffices to conclude that William indeed is, as the circumstantial evidence outlined above suggests, a child of Philip & Elizabeth
Information courtesy of #49068926