Senekal is a town situated on the N5 National Route between Winburg and Bethlehem in the Free State province of South Africa.
The town lies on the banks of the Sand River in the eastern region of the Free State province.
Senekal was established on 7 June 1877 on the farm De Puk in the district of Winburg. It is the panoramic Eastern Free State on the main route between Bloemfontein and in the heart of a flourishing and progressive agricultural district. The first sales of the plots started on 25 May 1875 and were a huge success. Thirty plots were sold for R4 600.
The town was named after Commandant FP Senekal, who led the encroachment of Basotho lands with the Boers under the Orange Free State government. Senekal died in 1865 during a skirmish called Senekal’s War.
Senekal is the second largest town in Setsoto Local Municipality after Ficksburg.
Senekal has two townships, OR Tambo Section and Matwabeng, the former being the latest, largest and fastest growing.
This town is an important producer of milk, maize, wheat, sunflower, and meat livestock. The majority of its inhabitants speak Afrikaans and Sesotho
Built of sandstone and erected in 1896 in the middle of the business centre, is the stately and historic NG Church with the equally historic wall of fossilised tree trunks that surrounds the church. It has been declared a historic monument. According to scientists, these tree trunks are approximately 250 million years old. The fossils were removed at the Sand River, west of Senekal.
The Dutch Reformed Church in Senekal was built on the same place as where the original Dutch Reformed Church stood since 1875 to 1895. The church became too small and was replaced by the current church. JH and AE Till were the architects and the builder was Rowe Marshall and Hill. The church was initiated on 17 December 1896.
The church is situated in Van Riebeeck Street in the middle of Senekal.
A wall of petrified tree trunks encircles the historic old Dutch Reformed Church. According to scientists these tree trunks are approximately 250 million years old. The longest trunk with a length of 17.5 m is situated in the western side of the ring-wall. Die fossil tree trunks were excavated next to the Sandrivier, west of Senekal. The tree fossils belong to various Dadoxylon tree species; under which is the Dadoxylon Sclerosum and is – according to some palaeontologists – related to the plant division Coniferophyta to which the current pine and yellowwood belong.
