This three part jig is based on an earlier two-part tune called Follow Me Down To Carlow, which is said to have been been played publicly for the first time in 1580 by the Irish war-pipers of Feagh MacHugh (Fiach McHugh O'Byrne) at the battle of Glenmalure. However, the tune may not be nearly that old, and its first publication was in the mid 19th century. There is an early 19th century dance of the same name from Armagh that is said to have been inspired by the dancing of the fairies on May Eve. The tune is used for the annual Maypole dance in Cambridge NY.
This tune is often attributed to John Stickle (1875-1957, but was actually written by his ancestor Friedemann Stickle (1794-1867). Pat Shuldham-Shaw recorded this origin as follows: ""One evening as Friedemann Stickle was sitting at his home in Burrafirth in the north of Unst, a brigantine in full sail sailed right across the mouth of the voe (a kind of minature fjord). The sight of it inspired him to take down his fiddle and compose this tune which has been preserved in his family every since." Although it is a jig, this tune is often played as part of a set to dance The Foula Reel, which of course is also really a jig. Aly Bain allegedly commented that the Shetlanders didn’t know the difference between a jig and a reel, but they may have been using an older meaning to "reel," namely as a general term for "dance."
The tune was introduced under the name "Come, Haste to the Wedding" in the pantomime The Elopement staged in London in 1767. However, it also appeared under the title "The Small Pin Cushion" in cellist-composer James Oswald's Caledonian Pocket Companion, Book 10 (London, 1760) and other publications that predate the pantomime. Oswalds may have been its composer, but its ultimate provenance remains unclear. The tune arrived in the New World soon afterwards, as evidenced by its inclusion in a 1778 notebook of a Boston fiddler who had been an officer in the Continental Army.