[1] A bureaucrat, revenue farmer (pachter) and businessman, he headed the influential Be family of Bagelen, part of the ‘Cabang Atas’ gentry of the Indies.

[1][2] Born in Central Java, Dutch East Indies (now Indonesia), Be was the eldest son of a ‘totok’ or first-generation Chinese migrant, the self-made tycoon and, later, bureaucrat Be Ing Tjioe, Majoor-titulair der Chinezen (1803–1857) by his ‘Peranakan’ wife, Tjoa Tjoe Nio.

[3] Be Biauw Tjoan, aged only 21, was raised to the bureaucratic post of Luitenant der Chinezen in Semarang in 1846, serving under his father-in-law.

[1] In 1863 – in a massive blow to the Be-Tan partnership – Ludolph Anne Jan Witt, Baron Sloet van de Beele, the Governor-General of the Dutch East Indies, stripped Be of his titular Chinese mayoralty, and imposed a hefty fine on him and his partners for their illegal opium dealings.

[3] In 1876, though his competitor submitted a formal complaint to the lower house of the Dutch parliament against Be’s supposed undermining of his opium farm, nothing was ever conclusively proven against him.