Flight Officer Russell Keith Jennings, age 20, served as a fighter pilot with the 87th Fighter Squadron, 79th Fighter Group, 12th Air Force of the U.S. Army Air Forces during World War II. On August 28, 1944, during the Battle of Montélimar, he was shot down while at the controls of his P-47 Thunderbolt (type D-16-RE, s/n 42-75997) by German aircraft. His plane, damaged during aerial combat, was seen descending toward Montbrison-sur-Lez, in the Drôme Department of France. FO Jennings likely attempted an emergency landing in a nearby field, but the aircraft, destabilized from its damage, slid along the ground and exploded against a hedgerow. He was killed instantly.

His body was exhumed from the crash site on September 6, 1944, and first moved to the U.S. Military Cemetery at Montélimar, then to Luynes, before being repatriated in 1948 to St. Charles, Illinois, USA, where he rests today. The monument honors him under the name “Flight Officer Keith Russell Jennings,” although his actual name was Russell Keith Jennings, with his first and middle names inadvertently reversed.

Source of information: http://francecrashes39-45.net