Callao, Peru, was a well known whaling, saltpeter, and guano port. Stan Hugill describes a notorious sailortown,
with its pubs and dives - the "Live and Let Live," the "Liverpool Bar," "Smokey Joe's," the "German Bar," and "Neptune". And its crimps and prostitutes were many - Yellow Jake, Jimmy the Pig, Serafina and Madame Gashee (both mentioned in sailor song); Liverpool Annie, who kept the "Liverpool Ship"; and Alec Townsend, the boarding-house master
Like most of Hugill's Scandinavian shanties, it comes from Capt. Sternvall's collection Sång Under Segel.