Gerhard Thyben

Infobox Military Person
name= Gerhard Thyben
lived=birth date|1922|2|24|df=y — death date and age|2006|9|4|1922|2|24|df=y


caption=
nickname="Gerd"
placeofbirth=Kiel
placeofdeath=Santiago de Cali, Colombia
allegiance=flagicon|Nazi Germany Nazi Germany
branch=Luftwaffe
serviceyears=1940-1945
rank=Oberleutnant
commands=7./JG 54
unit=JG 3, JG 54
battles=World War II
*Defense of the Reich
*Eastern Front
awards=Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross with Oak Leaves
laterwork=

Gerhard Thyben (24 February 1922 – 4 September 2006) was a German former Luftwaffe fighter ace and recipient of the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross with Oak Leaves during World War II.

Gerhard "Gerd" Thyben flew 385 combat missions and claimed 157 aerial victories. He claimed 152 victories on the Eastern Front, including 28 Il-2 Sturmoviks and five victories on the Western Front. He flew 22 fighter-bomber missions on which he claimed two aircraft and seven trucks destroyed on the ground.

Biography

Gerhard Thyben was born on 24 February 1924 in Keil. He volunteered for military service in the Luftwaffe in late 1940 and by summer 1941 gained his pilot's licence.

On 8 May 1945 he claimed his last victory over the Baltic Sea. He shot down a Petlyakov Pe-2 that was almost certainly looking for German refugee ships escaping from the besieged Courland Pocket. Thyben caught the reconnaissance Pe-2 at 07:54 and achieved what very well might have been the last Focke-Wulf Fw 190 victory of World War II. The Pe-2 crew, consisting of Starshiy Leytenant Grigoriy Davidenko, Kapitan Aleksey Grachev, and Starshina Mikhail Murashko were all killed in the engagement. Thyben surrendered to the British on touching down. Following his release in 1946 he traveled to Spain and Argentina before serving as an instructor with the Colombian Air Force.

Awards

* Iron Cross (1939) 1st and 2nd Class
* Ehrenpokal der Luftwaffe (31 August 1943)
* German Cross in Gold (24 October 1943)
* Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross with Oak Leaves
** Knight's Cross (6 December 1944)
** Oak Leaves (8 April 1945)

References

* Fellgiebel, Walther-Peer. "Die Träger des Ritterkreuzes des Eisernen Kreuzes 1939-1945". Friedburg, Germany: Podzun-Pallas, 2000. ISBN 3-7909-0284-5.
* Patzwall, Klaus D. & Scherzer, Veit. "Das Deutsche Kreuz 1941 - 1945 Geschichte und Inhaber Band II". Norderstedt, Germany: Verlag Klaus D. Patzwall, 2001. ISBN 3-931533-45-X.
* Weal, John (1998). Focke-Wulf Fw 190 Aces of the Russian Front. Oxford: Osprey. ISBN 1-85532-518-7.