Here's what I was looking for. "Singers of the Sea," by Bill Adams, in "The Outlook" (May 27, 1925), p. 168:

"Did you ever hear this sailor chantey?

When whaling Johnnie went to sea,
    Whaling Johnnie, hi-hoh!
A randy dandy lad was he,
    All bound away to Hilo.

[Similarly:]

But whaling John, when he came back,...
He'd shell-fish growing down his back....

His gal had wed a tailor bold,...
Young whaling Johnnie's heart was cold....

Of rum he drank a steaming dram,...
Said he: 'I'll go and fish, by damn!'...

And still he wanders there and back,...
With shell-fish growing down his back...."

It would be easy to imagine that Adams himself was the author, but he goes on to say, "It was at midnight in 60[degrees] south that I heard it, sung not on my own ship but on an unseen ship that passed close by."

And that's all Bill Adams had to say about "Whaling Johnny."