Erwin Tiebel married his wife Isolde Hordler in October 1941. Isolde was also from a Dresden family, and until Erwin Tiebels's transfer in Berlin in 1943 they lived together in Radeberg near Dresden. The marriage produced two children, Wolfgang and Heidemarie, who were aged 19 and 17 at the end of 1961, so were presumably both born between 1942 and 1945. After 1945 the couple were separated. Erwin Tiebel could not return to the part of Germany that was now administered as the Soviet occupation zone for "political reasons", presumably based on his membership of the security establishment during the Nazi years: Isolde Tiebel, whose mother had recently died, could not leave her father alone in Dresden after he returned from his time as a prisoner of war.