So, in summary so far, we have:
- a story said to relate the song to 17/18th. C. real life characters. We don't have an idea of how long that story is around.
- 19 C. ballad sheets
- Herbert Hughes arrangement at the beginning of the 20th. C. Haven't yet seen his comments, if any. May well be the main source of modern singing of the song - particularly as a parlour song.
- Padraigín's indirect report of Mrs. Humphrey's claim of a version in Gaelic. It would be nice to have more detail on this. Such claims are often made by English speakers without direct knowledge of the language and its song repertoire. This does not appear to be the case here.

Regards