The town was formed on the farm "Nooitgedacht" purchased from P.J. Fourie in 1879 and proclaimed on 12 February 1880. It was managed by the church until 1895 when the government of the South African Republic took over its management. Cachet named it after a town in the Netherlands. Cachet was an outspoken preacher, who had a strong interest in evangelism to Jews, his own family having Jewish heritage. Cachet had met and been influenced by Hermanus Willem Witteveen from Ermelo in the Netherlands as a young man, and named the settlement in honour of Witteveen.