I have an old journal from my great grandpa who was a mine worker. In it he talks about "Mother Jones" comming to organize a strike and all the workers singing She'll be comming round the mountian for a few days before she arrived. He mentions how glad he is singing it because it makes his bosses so mad. For whatever reason the miners took that song and linked it to her. I've hear the railroader also sang it about her. Sounds to me like they took an old nergo spiritual and changed it just a bit to fit what they wanted.