Discussion Forum—A Way with Words, a fun radio show and podcast about language

This morning, I learned that Sir Francis Drake's most famous prize was the galleon Nuestra Señora de la Concepción which was nicknamed Cacafuego which means "shit fire" or Cagafueg, which means "fire shitter". (I'm not sure that the controversy over which one is correct is worth the gunpowder to blow one's nose.)

Which brings me to my first mother-in-law, Beelzebub, who used to say, "shit fire and save little matches" as an expletive of exasperation and frustration.  Online, I find that the usual expression is Southern, and the little is omitted. Indiana is really a Southern state, culturally, and the little is reasonably an individual variation, but I'm wondering about the origin of the phrase.

I assume that most of us have worked at sit-down jobs.  Roseanna Cash has stated that she would never allow the "Ring of Fire" to be used for hemorrhoid ointment advertising, although Johnny Cash joked that he ought to license it for that purpose, and if you have a case of the Kentucky Quickstep, you can carry through stomach acid to the delicate tissues just inside the rectum which makes "flaming asshole" such vivid imagery.  I watched the word "flamers" gain popularity on USENET as a euphemism for those who need asbestos underbritches.

But I always assumed that flaming asshole was a 20th century expression, since I never encountered it in old literature.  Drake captured that Spanish ship in 1578.  The google ngram viewer shows "shit fire" with a little bump from 1905-1910 and then it took off again am 1960. The oner for "flaming asshole" starts about 1964 and peaked in 2004 abouit 50% higher than current usage.  There are no ngam hits for "shit fire and save matches", but that's more an oral language expression than a written one, and book publishing is a New Yorkish thing.  Anybody know how far back and where "shit fire and save matches" comes from - and while we're at it, when and in what language "shit fire" became common.