Ball + Arnaz's Children Sought Out To Prove Paternity Claims

Legendary comedians LUCILLE BALL and DESI ARNAZ have returned to the spotlight following a resurgence of rumours the couple fathered an unknown child.

Madeline "Linda" Jane Dee was allegedly given up for adoption by Ball in 1947 amid fears a baby would impede her plans for stardom, according to her daughter Cassandria Lucianna Carlson, 38.

Now the New York Post has reported Private Detective Vito Colucci has urged the couple's two publicly known children, Lucie Arnaz and Desi Arnaz Jr. to "put this (the case) to rest" by providing DNA samples to prove paternity.

He adds that he believes Carlson's account, based on facts "accumulated over the years".

Dee was born four years before the 1951 debut of hit U.S. TV show I Love Lucy and immediately given up for adoption to California nurse Ruth Smith.

Carlson claims she discovered her mother's paternity after phoning Smith from a funeral home to help locate Dee's birth records following her mother's death in 2003.

Records name Helen Elizabeth Barnes as Dee's mother. There is no listed father.

But according to the newspaper, several attempts made by Carlson to establish the truth have been shunned by her allegedly estranged family.

In a letter written by Lucie Arnaz to Carlson in 2004, she protests: "I must inform you we're almost certainly not related. In 1947, my parents were married and wanted nothing more than to have a baby together. They struggled for 10 years with infertility and miscarriage until I came along in 1951. My mother would never have given up a child of hers nor would my father have let her."

A spokesperson for Desi Arnaz Jr. and Lucie Arnaz did not respond to repeated requests for comment.