Here's a quote from the Shorter New Oxford Book of Carols

In the introduction to The Songs of John Jacob Niles (1975), Niles reported that he wrote this carol in 1933, basing it on a fragment he had overheard in the courthouse square in Murphy, Cherokee County, North Carolina. He published it in his Songs of the Hill-Folk (1934), where verse 1 is repeated after verse 3.

It may not be traditional, but I love the haunting melody of this song.
-Joe Offer-