Johann Sigmund Heffele was born on 20 July 1737 in Sulzfeld southeast of Heidelberg (now in Baden-Württemberg). He married 24 March 1761 in Sulzfeld to Maria Margarethe Beisel, the daughter of Friedrich Jacob Beisel & Anna Salome Völke. She was born in Sulzfeld on 17 December 1735.
They immigrated first to Denmark (Schleswig-Holstein) settling in the colony of Friedrichsanbau before continuing on to Dobrinka where they arrived on 15 April 1765 and are listed there in Household No. 3 on the 1767 Census. The rest of the Beisel family followed the next year (1766) and settled in Dreispitz.
Johann Heffele, the younger brother of Johann Sigmund is recorded on the 1767 Census of Dreispitz in Household No. 22. He was born 18 February 1746 in Sulzfeld and had also immigrated first to Denmark along with the household of his uncle Johann Georg Heffele, a weaver.
- Eichhorn, Alexander. The immigration of German colonists to Denmark and their subsequent emigration to Russia in the years 1759-1766 (Deiningen, Germany: Steinmeier, 2012).
- Lang, Gerhard. German Colonists of Denmark on the Volga .
- Pleve, Igor. Einwanderung in das Wolgagebiet, 1764-1767 Band 1 (Göttingen: Göttinger Arbeitskreis, 1999): 314.