Elusive

London, Feb. 17: Satyajit Ray had a high opinion of Charlie Chaplin, the English comic actor, film director and composer who was born in Walworth, south London, on April 16, 1889, and died, aged 88, in Vevey, Switzerland, on December 25, 1977.

“If there is one name which can be said to symbolise the cinema – it is Charlie Chaplin,” declared Ray in a centenary tribute in 1989. “I’m sure Chaplin’s name will survive even if the cinema ceases to exist as a medium of artistic expression. Chaplin is truly immortal.”

But hitherto secret papers released in London today by the National Archives in Kew, west London, suggest Chaplin may not have been born in London on the day generally accepted as his birthday.

In fact, the mystery gets curiouser and curiouser – Charlie Chaplin may not have been born Charlie Chaplin.

The documents have been seen by The Telegraph.

MI5, Britain’s intelligence organisation, dug deep into Chaplin’s background to try and find as much dirt on him as possible at the behest of the Americans who were obsessed he was a dangerous Communist.

Ultimately, British intelligence could not confirm any of the American suspicions. In fact, MI5 could not even find the actor’s birth certificate so who he really was must remain an open question.

File KV2/3700 on Charles (“Charlie”) Spencer Chaplin contains telegrams back and forth between the paranoic Americans and increasingly irritated British intelligence plus a heap of yellowing newspaper clippings. MI5 had to go on one wild goose chase after another to satisfy the Americans who were convinced Chaplin was a no good Commie and wanted the Brits to dig up the evidence to confirm their worst fears.

In his 1940 film, The Great Dictator, Chaplin had lampooned Adolf Hitler but this was not enough to satisfy the Americans of the actor’s sound political instincts.

Chaplin lived in America from 1910 to 1952, churning out hit after hit for Hollywood as the “Little Tramp” but he never took up American citizenship – which was another black mark against him.

The US authorities asked MI5 to look into the actor’s background when he left America in 1952 under a cloud of suspicion over his communist links. There had been controversy over his two marriages to 16-year-old girls, claims he had fathered an illegitimate child and over 2 million dollars apparently owed in back taxes.

Chaplin wanted to attend the London premiere of his classic Limelight in September 1952.

After scouring the files at Somerset House in London for his birth certificate, including checks for his supposed alias “Israel Thornstein”, MI5 concluded: “It would seem that Chaplin was either not born in this country or that his name at birth was other than those mentioned.”

Scotland Yard’s Special Branch passed on an unreliable tip from a source who claimed the actor was born near Fontainebleau, just south of Paris.

A police memo to MI5 noted: “There may or may not be some truth in this, but in view of the fact that no documentary proof has been obtained that Chaplin was born in the United Kingdom, it may well be that he was in fact born in France.”

MI6, Britain’s foreign intelligence service, investigated further but found no trace of Chaplin’s birth in either Fontainebleau or nearby Melun.

However, John Marriott, then head of MI5’s counter-subversion branch, was not convinced that the absence of a birth certificate was a matter of concern for the intelligence services.

He wrote: “It is curious that we can find no record of Chaplin’s birth, but I scarcely think that this is of any security significance.”

While he was out of the country, US attorney-general James McGranery announced he would deny the actor a re-entry permit because of his alleged Soviet connections.

The British were also asked to check whether there had been flattering articles about Chaplin in the Russian newspaper, Pravda. Again, nothing was found.

MI5 was unimpressed with the American allegations and said: “His name has, of course, been exploited in the interests of communism as one of the victims of ‘McCarthyism’...

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.”

The British government wanted to honour Chaplin but did not want to upset the Americans. Chaplin was finally given a knighthood and became Sir Charlie Chapin after a 20-year delay in March 1975.

But the mystery of his birth certificate remains unsolved.