According to liner notes from Paramount Old Time Tunes, "

Other popular music historians--Edward B. Marks, Sigmund Spaeth, Douglas Gilbert-- are of the opinion that the song was popularized before Trevathan got his hands on it my Mama Lou, the short, fat, homely belligerant powerhouse singer in Babe Conner's classy St. Louis brothel, a popular establishment in the 1890's that drew all sorts of people in its. day.

Either Trevathan picked up the song from Mama Lou, or equally likely, both learned it from black oral tradition in the south of the early 1890's. Gilbert cites, in addition to Trevathan's 1896 copyright, a nearly identical version pulblished by Delaney the same year, crediting Will Carleton with the words and J.W. Cavanaugh with the music. In other words, the song seems to have been around before Trevathan gave it to May Irwin to popularize.

I believe the above is the original copyrighted version.