Neel Ernest Kearby (June 5, 1911 – March 5, 1944) was a United States Army Air Forces colonel and P-47 Thunderbolt pilot in World War II who received the Medal of Honor for his actions in combat.

Kearby is the first United States Army Air Forces fighter pilot to have received the Medal of Honor.

Kearby commanded the 14th Pursuit Squadron in the Panama Canal Zone from December 1940 to August 1942, where he flew P-39 Airacobras.

In June 1943, now a lieutenant colonel, Kearby arrived in Australia with his fighter group after months of training on the P-47 Thunderbolt.

They used their turbo supercharged engines to fly at high altitude to the target and dove on the Japanese planes before firing their eight .50-caliber machine guns on the lightly armored enemy aircraft.

The ensuing combat lasted close to an hour, and when it was over, Kearby had shot down six enemy planes: four Nakajima Ki-43s and two Kawasaki Ki-61s.

This made Kearby the first P-47 ace of the Pacific Theater of Operations, and set a United States Army Air Forces record for most victories in a single mission.

The American record for most victories in single mission is nine, set a year later by USN F6F Hellcat pilot, David McCampbell.

Kearby's record was later broken within the United States Army Air Force as well, when P-51 Mustang pilot William Shomo downed seven Japanese planes in a six-minute fight over the Philippines in January 1945.

On March 5, 1944, Kearby took off on a combat patrol with Captain William D. Dunham and Major Samuel Blair to search for Japanese aircraft.

Kearby was observed by local people on the ground to have escaped by parachute and as he descended he became tangled in a tree and died of bullet wounds from the attack.

The enemy broke off in large numbers to make a multiple attack on his airplane but despite his peril he made one more pass before seeking cloud protection.