By recapturing Detroit, the Americans had cut the principal route by which the British at Fort Mackinac and other posts in the North West were supplied. During the winter, the British opened an alternate route overland from York on Lake Ontario via Yonge Street to Holland Landing and the Holland River. From here, the route entered Lake Simcoe and led to the head of Kempenfeldt Bay (Barrie) where Nine Mile Portage led to Willow Creek, the Nottawasaga River and Lake Huron. Lieutenant Colonel Robert McDouall reached Fort Mackinac via this route on 19 May 1814, to take charge of the post and the surrounding area. McDouall was accompanied by Lieutenant Newdigate Poyntz of the Royal Navy, who took charge of the naval establishment on Lake Huron, which essentially was "Nancy" only. (MacIntosh was retained as a pilot.) Plans to turn the schooner into a gunboat were discarded as unproductive, and the ship continued as a supply ship during that summer, making three round trips between the Nottawasaga and Mackinac.