Necker Island (British Virgin Islands) would survive their castaway adventure for at least three weeks, but as McCullin later recounted, "because of our gathering weakness ... out of temper, and out of water, we hoisted the red flag and were taken off in the early hours of the fifteenth day". According to McCullin, there was nothing idyllic about the desert island: "The mosquitos and other insects were more venomous and persistent than any I had encountered in Vietnam or the Congo." Richard Branson's "Extreme Tech Challenge" has been hosted annually at Necker Island since 2015. Described as one of the largest technology competitions in the
Jacques Necker noblemen, clergy, magistrates, merchants, men of letters, all flocked to St. Ouen. Joseph II sent his condolences and Catharine the Great invited him to Russia. In August 1781 Madame Necker went as far as Utrecht to buy the libels that appeared in the name of Turgot against her husband. She even tried to have the booksellers arrested. Did Necker and his brother receive annually 8 million livres as a pension? In any case Jacques bought an estate in Coppet and Louis in Cologny, both near Lake Geneva. In retirement, Necker, believing in "credible policy", occupied himself with law and economics,