Eek! Peace! Folklorist Lydia Parrish edited the book Slave Songs of the Georgia Sea Islands (Creative Age Press, 1942) in which a version of the song was published. She didn't compose the song. Alan Lomax collected what's probably the popular version of the song "from the singing of Negro roustabouts" in Savannah, Georgia, 1944, and undoubtedly shared it with Seeger and others. He published the song in Folk Songs of North America (Doubleday, 1960), and says "see Parrish...."

Guest, you can type "pay me my money" into the "Search" box at the top of the screen to see what else has been written about it here at the Mudcat.

I imagine it shows up on some recording of sea songs (though not likely you'll find any in your average record store).

The Ballad Index doesn't cite any recordings (which doesn't mean there aren't any, just that it doesn't show up on any of the recordings that have been indexed there).

~ Becky in Tucson