The use of 'go/went' for 'say/said' seems on the increase in everyday speech in England. So we hear people describing conversations who say 'I say/ said to her " That can't be right to do that" so she goes/ went " It's none of your business"'. 'Like' is sometimes added before or after the quote (..business" like,)as though to add (or perhaps stress) that the words are not meant to be exact but to give the gist and tenor, the mood, of the statement.It may be that 'go'in itself is meant to do this , being preferred to the neutral 'say'.

How common is this use of 'go' in the US and who uses it ?
Does anyone know whether it has a long history?

I don't know any background, but it is fairly common for youger people to use it that way in the US when speaking informally. It is also part of the cliche of valley-girl speak (along with 'like').

It does seem somewhat similar to phrases like "the car goes vroom" or "so the story goes."

LOL Fred.

Just wait until you hear them start saying: "she was all like, and then, I was all like. Ya know?"

I hear people of all ages saying "go" and "goes"...

He was telling the story and then she goes "what are you talking about" and then I go, "aren't you listening" and then she goes...blah, blah, blah.....with all the go and going, you'd think they'd be gone

The usage you speak of is common in my experience here in the colonies, too, Fred.

You might find the following of some interest also (then, again, maybe not ). I grew up in a "racially-mixed" neighborhood. When narrating a sequence of pure actions, the white children of my acquaintance all used the verb "go/went," as in "Well, first she went 'smack', so then I went 'pow', and then..." (we we're a rather violent lot, I'm afraid, and we often used only a gesture in place of the words in single quotes in contexts like the above.) The Black children in our neighborhood uniformly preferred the verb "say/said" in these same kinds of situations: "So this fool said 'wham', so then I said 'pow' upside his head, and then..."

It's interesting (to me, at least) that this verbal behavior is precisely the opposite (or maybe 'complementary' is a better word for it) to the one you mention, in that "say" is substituted for "go," whereas in your examples "go" is substituted for "say."

There must be something about "go" and "say" that invites this kind of substitution of one for the other, in both directions. Don't ask me what it is, though.

'Go' for 'say'is used by all ages in much of the community but I've yet to see it written in non-fiction e.g. "So Einstein went 'What is this with Newton ?' writes Professor Hawking in his new, simpler and yet more populist explanation 'A Brief History of Timeouts; the Universe of the Globetrotters' ".

This usage is classless among young people. My fifteen year old daughter uses it, particularly on the 'phone to friends, prompting irritated elderly aunts to say 'So where did you all end up after all that travelling?'. They have now joined me in not mocking 'cool'or saying that we remember that from the greats of jazz and as before our time ( 'How quaint of you to revive it!').They are so square sometimes.

The Oxford Dictionary is little help here but it does give ' go 'Aah!' over babies' . Its use for 'become' or 'seem' as in 'She went all sarcastic' appears related too..

Ah well, that's how it goes.

That reminds me of a case on "People's Court" some years back.
One of the litigants kept saying "I go...and she goes..." and so on. (Irritating!)
Finally Judge Wapner told him to quit saying "go" and start saying "say"!
("Go" Wapner! )