During colonial days, Maryland's ports were expected to export furs, foodstuffs, timber, flax, and other products to England, but tobacco became the only notable item produced and exported there in large quantities. In the eighteenth century, Sotterley Creek accommodated fairly large ocean-going boats such as brigs, brigantines, and schooners, and brigs more than 100 feet long carried up to 500 hogsheads of tobacco in Atlantic and Caribbean trade. By the nineteenth century, severe silting made passage of the creek nearly impossible except for smaller sloops, and by the end of the Civil War the creek was abandoned entirely by tradesmen. Sotterley Plantation played an integral role in international and domestic trade in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, and plantation owners George Plater II and George Plater III inspected ships from England, Ireland, the West Indies, and domestic ports. Hogsheads of tobacco from Sotterley and neighboring plantations were shipped to British ports and exchanged for furniture, tools, paper, household items, linens, and other goods, while Sotterley received rum, sugar, molasses, and spices from Caribbean ports.