From the Frank C. Brown Collection of North Carolina Folklore, Volume III, #190;

190
NINETY-NINE BLUE BOTTLES
This sounds like a College song, though it may of course be a music-hall product. It is listed in Miss Pound's Midwestern syllabus, with "forty-nine" instead of "ninety-nine." Randolph (OFS III 210) reports it from Missouri. Presumably the blue bottles are bluebottle flies, though the term is not hyphenated in the manuscript.
'Ninety-Nine Blue Bottles.' Reported by K. P. Lewis as obtained in 1910 from Dr. Kemp P. Battle of Chapel Hill.

NINETY-NINE BLUE BOTTLES

Ninety-nine blue bottles were hanging on the wall;
Take one blue bottle away from them all
And ninety-eight blue bottles will be hanging on the wall.

Ninety-eight blue bottles were hanging on the wall;
Take one blue bottle away from them all
And ninety-seven blue bottles will be hanging on the wall.

"Etc., etc., until the last blue bottle is removed or until the singer faints from exhaustion."


-I wonder if Dr. Kemp P. Battle sang all the verses for the collector.... -Joe-