His mother, Kattarina Ossenbach, died in the plague, and he had a brother, Bernhardus von Staden, a Roman Catholic priest in Ahlen, and a sister.
After trouble erupted in the Livonian government, Staden sent a letter to his friend, Joachim Schroter at the border town of Dorpat, which was held by the Russians.
Staden's account of Russia, The Land and Government of Muscovy, was addressed to the Holy Roman Emperor, Rudolf II.
Staden hoped to influence the emperor to invade Muscovite Russia, restore the region to the Teutonic Order, and be rewarded.
He describes the targets of Ivan's terror as individual families which the Tsar believed to be dangerous to his authority, rather than against the entire boyar class as previously thought.
[3] According to Alshits, many of Staden's reports on Ivan the Terrible's Russian resemble the stories of Baron Munchausen's Narrative of his Marvellous Travels and Campaigns in Russia.