Unknowns

[dah]

Is it a general truism that graves marked as UNKNOWN are for soldiers who died beyond (rather than in or behind) their own front line?

I appreciate that you can be unknown for a variety of reasons……as a result of a direct hit by shellfire (which could happen anywhere) or that your originally identified grave might subsequently become unidentifiable through shellfire. ….because someone removed your one and only ID tag (pre-November 1916) etc, etc

BUT….. is it GENERALLY true that the greater majority of unknowns (ie. those guys on the Menin Gate, Tynecot and Thiepval memorials etc) died as a direct consequence of going over the top?

David