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ERUPTION OF MT. TAMBORA AND AMERICAN WESTWARD EXPANSION

Aaron Burshtein, Spencer Yan, Jake Shulman
5 March 2013
Period 6

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On 5 April 1815, the largest volcanic eruption in history occurred off the island of
Sumbawa in Indonesia. Nearby observers recorded that, for nearly two hours, the sky above
Mount Tambora, the largest mountain on the Indonesian peninsula, filled with an ever-increasing
pillar of ash - what one called a tree of smoke
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, a phrase that would aptly come to describe the
quasi-religious effect the eruption had on its victims. For nearly five years after that, the entire
world would be shaken by the eruption; but none more so than the newly-found America, which
would experience an era of intense destabilisation due not just to widespread agricultural and
economic failure but also an incredible sense of divine persecution. The rapid uprooting of both
physical and spiritual securities, as a result of the eruption, would in turn inspire a large
westward expansionist movement especially into several newly-established territories including
Ohio and Indiana.
By June of 1816, America would begin to feel the devastation of the eruption. The plume
of ash and dust ejected nearly eighteen miles into the sky had directly altered weather systems
worldwide, causing the global temperature to drop about 5.5 degrees Fahrenheit. Europe and
America, as a result, experienced long droughts followed by month-long periods of heavy rain
and sub-freezing temperatures. In July - about the onset of what historians call the Year Without
a Summer in America - reports of the eruption of Mount Tambora had reached the United
States, though there was no shortage of theories establishing a causal relationship between the
eruptions tremendous ash cloud and the unusually-frigid conditions experienced in America yet.
However, there was no shortage of initial theories, ranging from the scientifically-hypothesised
to the hardly-plausible superstitious. The most common theory favoured by newspapers and
reputable sources attempted to correlate the sudden drop in temperature with fluctuations

1
Asiatic Journal, August 1816, p 165
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observed in sunspots some years prior. One columnist writing for the Brattleboro Reporter
mused in a weather report:
The sun is no doubt the great fountain of calor, or heat, as well as of light, and
it is very rational to suppose that the objects which exhibit to us the
appearance of spots on the sun, by intercepting the calorific rays, may have
deprived the earth of some part of the quantity which it usually receives.
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However, most Americans, predisposed to spiritualistic answers, looked to Providence for an
explanation for the disaster. Many Americans fell into what Washington Irving described as a
feverish excitement. The terrifying winter conditions of the summer of 1816, filled the
imagination with dreams of horror and apprehensions of sinister and dreadful events.
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A
spiritual terror gripped the hearts of many religious Americans, and the Puritanical tradition to
associate meteorological phenomena with the divine particularly contributed to this epidemic of
fear and awe. The weather was the physical manifestation of Gods wrath - the very handwriting
of God.
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It was the handwriting of God that ultimately inspired New Englanders to flee from their
homes and move westward, where promises of fertile land and warm air resided. Farmers,
historically, take a backseat to none except perhaps priests in ascribing theological significance
to natural occurrences. With a fate based entirely around tracking patterns throughout nature,
superstition naturally governs a farmers career, and is often ubiquitous in every aspect of his
life. With religious enthusiasm a staple of 19th-century America already, it is unsurprising to
observe that even amongst well-educated American farmers astronomical patterns provided the
blueprint for success. The alignments of the stars and the planets and the moons stages served as

2
Brattleboro Reporter, 7 July 1816
3
Sanford, Charles L. Quest for America: 1810-1824. New York: New York University Press, 1980. p. 109
4
Laskin, David. Braving the Elements: The Stormy History of American Weather. New York: Doubleday,
1996. p. 56
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the farmers go-to source for prognostication - so when their bases of prediction were virtually
upended, it was a sign for them to immediately flee from what one Virginian called this
godforsaken land
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.
The beginning of 1816 marked the pinnacle of the agricultural golden age for the New
England territories.
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With the economy transitioning comfortably from subsistence farming to
commercial agriculture due to new technology, prospects of American agriculturalism seemed
hopeful. Expanding urban centres provided a constant demand for crops and forged a strong
domestic market. Further, with European agricultural production crippled by the Napoleonic
Wars, foreign trading also became a viable option, and American exports provided a
skyrocketing economy especially in grain products such as wheat and corn. Grain production
became the way of life for many, and by mid-spring, a means of prosperity. But when the cold
wave of 1816 passed over killing vast quantities of crops due to subfreezing temperatures and
heavy rains, the farmers saw their entire way of life destroyed, and were left with the options of
death or westward movement. Samuel Goodrich, a farmer, stated in his diary that, Severe frosts
occurred every month; June 7th and 8th snow fell, and it was so cold that crops were cut down,
even freezing the roots. The farmers were faced with the bleak decision of moving west or
dying.
At the arrival of the cold wake, many farmers, realising they would never be able to
survive the winter of 1816, sold everything they owned and headed west, where - following the
War of 1812 which resulted in the removal of Native American tribes from the Ohio River
Valley - luxuriant lands with rich loam soil and a mild and salubrious climate
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awaited, offered

5
Beckley, Hosea. The History of Vermont. Brattleboro: George H. Salisbury, 1846. p. 137.
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Lamb, H.H. Climate, History and the Modern World. London: Routledge, 1995. p. 86.
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Klingaman, William K. The Year Without Summer: 1816 and the Volcano that Darkened the World and
Changed History. New York: Saint Martins Press. 2013. p. 201-202.
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at generous prices to anyone willing to pay. According to historian Lewis Stilwell, Something, it
seemed, had gone permanently wrong with the weather, and when this cold season piled itself on
top of all the preceding afflictions, a good many... were ready to quit.
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Goaded on by
descriptions of Ohio as an earthly Paradise, where every thing which is considered a luxury,
might be had almost without care, labour or exertion, so many emigrants from New England
flooded into the western areas that the period has come to be known as the Ohio Fever.
Population in Western states boomed almost immediately. Ohios population nearly doubled
from 1810 to 1817 (230,760 to just over 400,000). Indiana, even more spectacularly, saw a rise
from 24,500 in 1810 to nearly 100,000 in 1817, gaining 42,000 settlers in the summer of 1816
alone.
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The greatest contributor to mounting pressures for westward emigration from the New
England territories was the mass crop failure afflicting a people who interpreted their lives based
on the judgment of God; but undoubtedly a constantly-growing population due to mass European
immigration (particularly the Irish and French, who suffered from widespread famine ostensibly
also a product of the eruption
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, a product of first, unending rain, and then severe drought) and a
national economic collapse arising from the virtual evaporation of both foreign and domestic
markets only further aggravated the downward spiral. The former, particularly, was troubling;
overpopulation in a land nearly exhausted of fertility after generations of agricultural cultivation
only further stripped away at already-dwindling resources. The deleterious effects of tree felling
for timber trade and vanishing wildlife and game for hunting only further accelerated the

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Stilwell, Lewis D. Migration from Vermont. Montelier: Vermont HIstorical Society, and Rutland: Academy
Books, 1948. pp. 229-230
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Klingaman, The Year Without Summer, p. 341.
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Klingaman, The Year Without Summer, pp. 202-657.
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deterioration of the land.
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A series of epidemics that tore through New England from 1813-14
sealed the deal; New England had become a hell on earth, and Paradise was the West.
The eruption of Mt. Tambora plunged the world into a period of terrifying meterological
phenomena, marked by extreme precipitation followed by long droughts and subfreezing cold.
America, a nation only recently established, was weak after several wars and internal conflicts,
and had only begun to recover when the cold drafts of 1816, triggered by the volcanos residual
deposits of ash into the air, swept in and virtually destroyed the existing agriculture of the east
coast. While many theories were offered, ultimately the agricultural population - the foundation
of the countrys economic and demographic stability - turned to its superstitious roots and,
inspired by religious fear and disastrous harvests, decided that nature was sending them a clear
and indisputable message of punishment. Generous prices for western regions such as Ohio and
Indiana after the War of 1812 as well as growing concerns of overpopulation and
overconsumption of already-dwindling resources in the East secured the farmers decision to
move west and occupy the new territories. While generally unmentioned in history textbooks, the
eruption of Mt. Tambora helped usher in an era of interest in the western prospect by providing a
necessary impetus to move an otherwise firmly-rooted people, and showing them a new frontier.
Throughout history, disaster has proven repeatedly its role as not just a force of immense
destruction but also a significant catalyst for progress. While in the short run the eruption of Mt.
Tambora had a devastating effect on the American nation, it was what showed people the future
that lay in the West, and inspired generations of curiosity.



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Klingaman, Year Without Summer, pp. 270-271.
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Works Cited

Asiatic Journal, August 1816.

Beckley, Hosea. The History of Vermont. Brattleboro: George H. Salisbury, 1846.

Brattleboro Reporter, 7 July 1816.

Klingaman, William K. The Year Without Summer: 1816 and the Volcano that Darkened
the World and Changed History. New York: Saint Martins Press. 2013.

Lamb, H.H. Climate, History and the Modern World. London: Routledge, 1995.

Laskin, David. Braving the Elements: The Stormy History of American Weather. New
York: Doubleday, 1996.

Sanford, Charles L. Quest for America: 1810-1824. New York: New York University
Press, 1980.

Stilwell, Lewis D. Migration from Vermont. Montelier: Vermont HIstorical Society, and
Rutland: Academy Books, 1948.
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