How old is the phrase, "All's well and the goose hangs high"? So far, I can't find it before 1855, in a history of Kansas, not long before the Civil War.

"'And everything is lovely and the goose hangs high,' John Buford and the Hanging of Confederate Spies During the Gettysburg Campaign," Gettysburg Magazine, no. 18, Dec. 1997, pp. 5-14.

"The old Army of the Potomac is pretty sore-footed; but everything is moving and the goose hangs high." Excerpt from letter, J. H. M. to his mother, July 9, 1863. Civil war letters, edited by William J. Miller. www.pabucktail.com.

One of those trivia sites says the phrase originally was "The goose honks high," but most trivia sites are full of bunkum.

"Oh, everything is lovely and the goose hangs high." Saying of a Thadeus Prentice, 1855. History of Lawrence, Kansas, Chap. 6.
hangs High