after a probe into U.S. claims he was a communist sympathiser, documents released on Friday (February 17) revealed.

Chaplin, one of Hollywood's first and greatest stars famed for his "Little Tramp" character, believed he was born on April 16, 1889, in south London.

But, an exhaustive search by MI5 found no record of his birth anywhere, nor anything to suggest he was any kind of security risk, declassified files from the spy agency revealed.

The file shows no one called Charles or Israel was born on April 16, and further inquiries into suggestions Chaplin had been born in France near Fontainebleau also proved fruitless.

MI5 said new evidence which emerged last year suggested Chaplin was born in a caravan belonging to a woman known as "the Gypsy Queen" in central England and his mother was a member of what is now referred to as "the travelling community".

The information was in a letter, found in a locked drawer, which had been sent to Chaplin a few years before his death in 1977 by a man called Jack Hill, who said the caravan's owner was his aunt.

During his long career, Chaplin courted controversy with overtly political films such as "The Great Dictator" a parody of German Nazi leader Adolf Hitler and "A King in New York", a satire on the anti-communist Cold War fears gripping America.

From the 1920s, U.S. authorities suspected him of being a communist supporter, a claim he always denied, and he was refused a re-entry permit when he left the United States in 1953 and went to live in Switzerland.

The MI5 file, which includes press cuttings, letters to and from the U.S. embassy and a telegram to Chaplin from a Soviet agent, shows the British agency also rejected the U.S. claims and concluded in 1958 he posed no risk.

"It may be that Chaplin is a communist sympathiser but on the information before us he would appear to be no more than a 'progressive' or radical," an MI5 officer wrote.

Among other declassified documents released on Friday were details of MI5 investigations into three Nobel prize-winning chemists, including Irene Curie and her husband, who were communist sympathisers.

Another file also details the actions of Folkert Van Koutrik a Dutch double agent who worked for German intelligence during World War Two.