On Dec. 18, 1859 Young and Mary Allen and their infant daughter, Mellie, sailed from New York and on July 13, 1860 reached Shanghai. From 1861 to 1866 while he was cut off from his church at home by the American Civil War, he worked as a coal and rice broker, a cotton buyer, teacher, editor and translator. Because of the poverty in the South he continued these employments and did as much preaching as he could. He also studied the Chinese classics and published a religious weekly, Jiao Hui Xin Bao, a precursor of the later on Wan Guo Gong Bao (see below). Lack of funds from the Board of Missions compelled him to support himself and his family. Nevertheless, on May 18, 1881, he announced his withdrawal after "an almost consecutive service of nearly eighteen years, in connection with the Educational, Editorial, and Translation Departments of the Government Institution here Shanghai," in order to devote his full-time to the work of Superintendent to which he succeeded when Rev. J. W. Lambuth returned to the United States because of ill health.