He was the eldest son of Eugene Chen, the leader of the left wing faction in the Kuomintang (Chinese Nationalist Party) and the Foreign Minister of the Republic of China,[1][2] and Agatha Alphosin Ganteaume (1878–1926), known as Aisy, daughter of a French Creole father who owned one of the largest estates in Trinidad.
[2] In the fall of 1926 Chen joined his father at the Foreign Office of the Nationalist Government and felt he "had come home" although he didn't speak any Chinese.
He was asked by his father to conduct Mikhail Borodin and other Russian advisors returning to the Soviet Union after the 12 April Purge of the Chinese Communist Party.
He stayed in Moscow for six years under his Russian name Pertsei Ievgenovich Tschen before he became advisor to the General Motors Corporation in their negotiations with the Soviet Commissariat of Heavy Industry with his wide knowledge of the conditions in Russia, probably the first Chinese person to be employed by a giant foreign corporation as its advisor in a foreign country.
He and Mok Ying-kwai also tried to bring the comfort mission from Canton to Hong Kong in support of the Tung Tau Tsuen fire victims in 1951.
The card requested their presence at cocktails, a European-style formal dinner, and a screening of Chinese films on the last Thursday of each month at the private dining room at the Mandarin Hotel.
In his later life, he was made the member of the 6th Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC) and was invited to witness the signing of the Sino-British Joint Declaration in December 1984.