The move from Williamsville to North Bush came when the entire region was sunk in the direst poverty by the depression that followed upon the Panic of 1837. Many of the area's Catholics were without work and often without food and could give little or nothing to support the Church. Neumann wrote to a fellow priest in Europe, "If you want to be a missionary, you have to love poverty and be entirely disinterested." Though he found himself $80 in debt at the end of the first year, he was satisfied that thanks to the people's gifts of corn and potatoes; he did not starve. Shortly after the move to North Bush, Bishop Dubois arrived on a visitation tour of the district. He expressed his pleasure upon seeing the more advanced stage of the buildings, the schools, the careful attention to the sick and the dying, and the weekly, even daily rounds made by the young pastor.