This song appears in L. A. Smith's The Music of the Waters (1888); Smith writes:
Any quick, lively tune, to which you might work a fire-engine, will serve for the music of a pumping song. The words vary with every fancy. "Pay me my money down" is a very favourite pumping chorus.
It is a very strange song for men so little given to avarice as sailors are. Their parting ceromy on embarking is usually to pitch their last shilling on to the wharf, to be scrambled for by the land-sharks. Nor yet does there seem much sense in it, but it serves to man and move the brakes merrily.
She provides one verse and explains the tune Paddle Your Own Canoe is sometimes used for the shanty.
Stan Hugill suggests it is an example of a West Indies shore-working song taken to sea and used for hauling.
The song was adopted by various skiffle groups and sung in a calypso manner. Other prominent recording groups include the Kingston Trio, who introduce the song as originating from the Bahamas.