The Archdukes decided that before taking on the Republic it was important to subdue the last Protestant enclave on the Flemish coast, the port of Ostend. The siege took three years and eighty days. Meanwhile, the stadtholders mopped up some more Spanish fortresses; Rheinberg capitulated in 1601, the following year in Brabant Grave fell and Sluys and Aardenburg were taken in what was to become States Flanders. Though these victories deprived the Archdukes of much of the propaganda value of their own victory at Ostend, the loss of the city was a severe blow to the Republic, and it brought about another Protestant exodus to the North.