Reilly's Rock: History
"You're going to get married, so you'll be needing a house.
I need an ox-wagon. If you buy me an ox-wagon I'll buy you a house."
The offer proved too much to refuse for Mickey Reilly, a member of the notorious Steinackers Horse Regiment during the Anglo-Boer war of 1899-1902. As a young Irish adventurer, Reilly had settled on the Mlilwane Farm to start a successful tin mining career managing the McCreedy Mines and embarking on a mixed farming operation. He built himself a modest mud hut at the top of the Mlilwane Hill in 1908, which was struck and gutted by lightening - a common occurrence in the area, which coined the siSwati name "Mlilwane" meaning "little fire". Reilly then built a second mud hut a little further down the hill, which again suffered the same fate. A third attempt to build a home was made, this time a wood and iron shack even further down the hill to avoid the wrath of lightening.
From mud hut to Reilly's Rock
Soon after the First World War of 1914-1918, Reilly was approached by an illiterate Afrikaner by the name of Moolman. A deal was soon struck - Moolman received an ox-wagon worth 80 pounds, and Reilly's Rock was born…
By sledge, by wagon and by hand-held stretcher, each rock was carried to a site where Moolman placed them one upon another until finally, several years later, the iron and wood shack was enclosed by a monument of stone.
Piece by piece the shack was dismantled and removed through the front door and Reilly was left with a Magnificent house to which he could bring his wife!
In 1942, Mickey Reilly married Billie Springle, the daughter of Key Springle mentioned in Jock of the Bushveld as Key, the American. For many years Billie was the only white woman between Mbabane and Manzini (then known Bremersdorp) where she lived her life in paradise as the wife of the most popular and most colourful white man in Swaziland.
On Mickey's passing, the Reilly family converted Mlilwane into Swaziland's first game reserve, governed by a non-profit making Trust. Billie and her sister, both widowed by this time, spent their later years in the tranquillity and safety of Reilly's Rock.
Two full were spent creatively fulfilling the task of tasteful renovation and adding the next generation's personal touch in many subtle ways. The result is a top quality, comfortably rustic, historically colonial masterpiece.
