Hi, CBJ - Here's the entry on "Sailor's Hornpipe" from Fuld's Book of World-Famous Music:

While this dance is presumably of English or Irish origin, its earliest known printing is in a book published in the United States about Aug., 1796, entitled Evening Amusement, p. 15, under the title College Horn pipe. The publishers are B. Carr's Musical Repositories, Philadelphia and New York, and J. Carr's, Baltimore. LC.
The earliest known British printing was entered at Stationers' Hall on Jan. 29, 1798, by J. Dale, London, under the title The College Horn pipe; BM and JF. A similarly titled edition published by Geo. Goulding, 45 Pall Mall, London, has a watermark 1800; JF. Chappell says that the tune was an old sailor's song called Jack's the Lad, but no printing under this title has been found. If the dance is of Irish origin, no Irish printing has been found prior to those mentioned above.

So, that's a start.
-Joe Offer-