I remember performing this song, or a close variant, as far back as 1957. I learned it from a fellow habitue' of a coffee house in Fresno, California. It seemed an obvious American variant of the more widely known "Moonshiner" done by the Clancy Brothers, among others. As I recall the melody, it may have evoked the "Wagoner's Lad," but was really quite different - a little simpler line. It had a little more melancholy sense about it than the Irish song. It was played with major chords, but almost had a strange minor feel. It may have come out of the collection of Alan Lomax in some form.