Arthur Hamilton Clark, in his description of a "typical" sailing day for the clipper ships from New York harbor during the Gold Rush, which is found in his THE CLIPPER SHIP ERA...1843-1869, gives an interesting version of "Blow, Boys, Blow" (p. 117). This was not published until 1912 and is Clark's reconstruction.

"A Yankee sloop came down the river,
Hah, hah, rolling John,
Oh what do you think that sloop had in her?
Hah, Hah, rolling John,
Monkey's hide and bullock's liver,
Hah, hah, rolling John."

http://books.google.com/books?id=HVYuAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA117&dq=%22Hah,+Hah,+rolling+John&cd=2#v=onepage&q=%22Hah%2C%20Hah%2C%20rollin

This looks like it is also in MINSTRELSY OF MAINE, by Ecstrom and Smyth, 1927.

http://books.google.com/books?id=8k5BAAAAMAAJ&q=%22Hah,+Hah,+rolling+John&dq=%22Hah,+Hah,+rolling+John&cd=1

This would seem to be related to the "hah! hah! rolling river" versions of "Shenandoah". It would be nice to actually be able to date this back to the 1850's and the Gold Rush, but I don't think it's possible on the basis of Clark's evidence.

I also wanted to mention that the version of "Shallow Brown" by William Fender, talks about a theft of a dollar and getting that dollar back, which reminded me of the "Dollar" song from Nordhoff as well as the "Spanish dollar" verse in the Short version of SB.

Detail.CFM?messages__Message_ID=2740843

http://books.google.com/books?id=MKoPAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA41&dq=%22see-man-do%22&cd=4#v=onepage&q=%22see-man-do%22&f=false