When I look at some of the sites that have the "original" as collected by someone, I often wonder about that person's ability to transcribe a tune. Like the archived text provided by Bruce O on "Going to the West". Taken from Folksongs of Alabama, it begins: "me-so-so-me" as a pickup to the higher "do", and my ear has trouble with that. Here's the blue clicky thing if you want to have a look. The first line sure doesn't make musical sense to me, and apparently it doesn't to others either, since it's about the first thing that was changed when people started performing it.
I've also got to say that my recent experience as a transcriber has added to my doubts about other's abilities. I'm working on one of Helen Kivnick's songs right now and I keep getting stuck on questions like "was that a dotted quarter, an eighth and a quarter, or was it a half note and two eighths?"
I used to be a news reporter. I'd identify myself as a writer and when people would ask: "Fiction or non-fiction?", I'd reply, "Non-fiction, if you believe in the difference".

I'm starting to suspect transcribing songs is a bit that way, too. You never get what the person sang, just what I heard.
Blessings,
Barbara