The Year Without Summer: 1816 and the Volcano That Darkened the World and Changed History
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Many climate scientists did not accept Humphreys’ theory immediately. While his temperature records were among the best available, they were patchy in many regions of the world and covered only three eruptions. A dearth of volcanic activity through the middle of the twentieth century provided few opportunities to collect supporting evidence; there were no eruptions to rival Krakatoa between 1912 (Novarupta) and 1991 (Pinatubo in Indonesia). Meteorologists tried to use industrial pollution as a surrogate for volcanic dust, but could not agree on whether pollution cooled the climate by reflecting sunlight or warmed it by trapping the heat radiating from cities. (The former outweighs the latter.) A lack of long-term, reliable observations again proved a stumbling block. Even as recently as 1977, a senior researcher in the field, Professor Sean Twomey, wrote that “the time and energy put into discussion perhaps outweigh the time and energy which have been put into measurements.”
With no volcanoes to study and at a roadblock with industrial pollution, scientists turned to the only other source of energy powerful enough to force particles into the stratosphere: nuclear bombs. By monitoring changes in sunlight after the nuclear-weapons tests of the 1950s, meteorologists discovered that the fine dust driven into the stratosphere could remain there and reflect sunlight for years. Meanwhile, newly available computer simulations demonstrated that the volcanic sulfuric acid droplets were likely of a similar size to those dust particles. Armed with this information and a growing database of global temperature records, scientists closely monitored two relatively minor eruptions—Mount Agung (Indonesia) in 1963 and Mount St. Helens (Washington State) in 1980—and confirmed their hypotheses from the nuclear-weapons tests: Volcanic eruptions caused the climate to cool by several degrees for two or three years. As scientists worked through the history of volcanic eruptions, they were finally able to conclusively link the stratospheric aerosol veil from Mount Tambora to the Year Without a Summer.
* * *
MOUNT Tambora erupted again in 1819, albeit on a much smaller scale, registering only a 2 on the Volcanic Explosivity Index. Subsequently it has erupted twice more, once sometime between 1847 and 1913 (the exact date is uncertain, since this and the following eruption were confined to the caldera) and again in 1967. It is still active. A series of earthquakes on Sumbawa in 2011 led the government of Indonesia to warn that Mount Tambora may be preparing to erupt once more, although experts believe it very unlikely that any explosion would approach the magnitude of the volcano’s eruption in April 1815.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
This book originated with a suggestion by our editor, Daniela Rapp, whose patient guidance and insights shepherded the manuscript to completion. Our agent and my longtime friend, Daniel Bial, provided essential support and his usual astute advice. I would also like to thank my research assistants, Anna Kearns, Miliana Budimirovic, and Julia Benjamin; Meg Grotti and the cheerfully helpful staff of the Morris Library at the University of Delaware; and Pat Garnett and the equally generous staff at the Albin O. Kuhn Library of the University of Maryland, Baltimore County. Any errors in the manuscript belong to Nick and myself alone.
My deepest gratitude, of course, goes to my family, without whom I could never have brought this book home.
—WILL KLINGAMAN
I would like to thank Dr. Bethan Harris of the Department of Meteorology, University of Reading, who pointed me in the direction of some very useful information on the eruption of Tambora and its effects on global climate. I should also thank Mrs. Catherine Turner, the Department of Meteorology librarian, who helped locate resources at the British Library. The staff at the British Library also provided assistance in locating the letters from Robert Peel to Lord Liverpool and Lord Sidmouth.
—NICK KLINGAMAN
NOTES
The page numbers for the notes that appeared in the print version of this title are not in your e-book. Please use the search function on your e-reading device to search for the relevant passages documented or discussed.
The first citation of a published source always includes an abbreviated title; subsequent citations employ only the author’s last name, unless we have used more than one book by that author.
1. THE VOLCANO
“a firing of cannon”: Asiatic Journal, August 1816, p. 165.
“several very distinct reports…”: Raffles, Memoirs, vol. 1, p. 279.
“do as much good”: Egerton, Raffles, p. 59.
“We had a most extensive…”: ibid., pp. 127–8.
“the sound appeared…”: Raffles, History, p. 30.
“seemed to forebode…”: ibid.
“extremely irritable…”: MacKenzie, Escape, p. 64.
“fatigue the senses…”: ibid., p. 65.
“Taking towns at his liking…”: Moore, Letters, p. 207.
“I want less…”: Coote, Napoleon, p. 158.
“an enemy and disturber…”: MacKenzie, p. 255.
“the sovereigns of Europe would be…”: ibid., p. 254.
“We are really going on…”: ibid., p. 198.
“a man fit only to cook…”: National Register, May 18, 1816.
“the Parisians love for…”: Coote, p. 84.
“the maintenance of an…”: Thompson, Letters, p. 307.
“the need for rest…”: Coote, p. 68.
“Our objective is to make sure…”: MacKenzie, p. 10.
“a troubled confused…”: Raffles, Memoirs, vol. 1, p. 283.
“to find it…”: Asiatic Journal, August 1816, p. 161.
“a heavy mortar fired…”: Asiatic Journal, August 1816, p. 166.
“Towards morning the reports…”: ibid., p. 165.
“By this time…”: ibid.
“By ten it was…”: ibid.
“The ashes now began…”: ibid., p. 166.
“perfect impalpable powder…”: ibid.
“The darkness was so profound…”: ibid.
“the atmosphere still continued…”: ibid.
“utter darkness”: Raffles, Memoirs, vol. I., p. 273.
“covered with ashes…”: ibid., p. 274.
“Our chiefs here…”: Asiatic Journal, August 1816, p. 164.
“supernatural artillery”: Raffles, Memoirs, vol. I, p. 270.
“neither read nor write…”: ibid.
“the trees also were…”: ibid., p. 271.
“a tremulous motion…”: Oppenheimer, “Consequences,” p. 238.
“showers of ashes…”: Raffles, History, p. 25.
“completely beaten down…”: Asiatic Journal, August 1816, p. 166.
“The trees and herbage…”: Raffles, Memoirs, vol. I., p. 284.
“the cattle and inhabitants…”: Asiatic Journal, October 1816, p. 422.
“the whole of his country…”: Asiatic Journal, August 1816, p. 167.
“the extreme misery to which…”: Raffles, History, p. 27.
2. PORTENTS
“the heaviest snow ever…”: Niles’ Weekly Register, May 18, 1816.
“a greater quantity of snow…”: National Register, May 11, 1816.
“was of a red and…”: Niles’ Weekly Register, May 18, 1816.
“something extraordinary has taken place…”: National Register, May 11, 1816.
“the snow was not white…”: Post, Subsistence Crisis, p. 22.
“It was brick red and…”: Gibb, Showers, p. 33.
“the cause of this universal fog…”: Franklin, “Meteorological Imaginations,” pp. 373–77.
“the sky exhibited in places…”: Symonds, Eruption, p. 394.
“The evening twilight…”: ibid.
“We are, happily, at peace…”: Cunningham, Circular Letters, p. 973.
“Go into the interior…”: Wood, Empire, p. 705.
“Among the most auspicious…”: Cunningham, p. 980.
“a spider, having parts…”: Maryland Gazette, May 12, 1816.
“its general appearance…”: Niles’ Weekly Register, May 4, 1816.
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�chasms in the [sun’s] atmosphere…”: North American Review, May 1816, p. 39.
“burning mountains of immense…”: Farmer’s Cabinet, May 11, 1816.
“a kind of excavation…”: ibid.
“no less a miracle…”: Gentleman’s Magazine, February 1817, p. 110.
“the Sun has cast forth…”: Chambersburg Democratic Republican, June 3, 1816.
“a very fine dust…”: Skeen, America Rising, p. 10.
“It had nothing of the…”: Bate, Song, p. 97.
“calamitous sign…”: Vail, “Bright Sun,” p. 186.
“the sun may, in time…”: Quarterly Journal of Science and the Arts, vol. 2, 1817, p. 420.
“the observation … that the light…”: North American Review, July 1816, p. 285.
“The winter was open…”: Ludlum, Vermont Weather, pp. 88–9.
“most persons allowed their fires…”: Schlegel, “The Year,” p. 1.
“January was mild…”: Connecticut Courant, October 19, 1850.
“shivering and shrinking…”: Ford, Writings, Jefferson to Charles Thomson, January 9, 1816, p. 6.
“The first of March…”: Ludlum, Vermont Weather, p. 89.
“Our own Winters are…”: Laskin, Braving, p. 84.
“would be Turned into Ice…”: ibid., p. 84.
“Both heats and colds…”: Jefferson, Notes, p. 80.
“it is a common opinion…”: Ludlum, Early American Winters, p. 214.
“in the cultivated part…”: Laskin, p. 85.
“It is a popular opinion…”: Webster, Papers, p. 119.
“I would enquire…”: Fleming, Meteorology, p. 5.
“Few, if any, registers…”: Laskin, p. 87.
“heathen wilderness…”: ibid., p. 66.
“Of all the scenes…”: Crevecoeur, Sketches, pp. 39–40.
“crops were destroyed by…”: Ludlum, Vermont Weather, p. 87.
“The country has all the appearance…”: American Beacon, May 9, 1816.
“the country in many places…”: National Register, May 18, 1816.
“a temperature extraordinary…”: American Beacon, May 9, 1816.
“We never experienced…”: Aberdeen Journal, June 26, 1816.
“stormy in the extreme…”: Aberdeen Journal, June 26, 1816.
“Even on the coast…”: Aberdeen Journal, June 26, 1816.
“Throughout the whole of this month…”: Aberdeen Journal, June 26, 1816.
“a considerable quantity of snow”: Gentleman’s Magazine, August 1816, p. 115.
“Never was there…”: Spater, Cobbett, p. 346.
“The extreme changeableness…”: Royal Cornwall Gazette, July 6, 1816.
“It is the opinion of the…”: Gentleman’s Magazine, January 1816.
“The nation was in the condition…”: Reid, Durham, p. 97.
“The main root of the…”: Niles’ Weekly Register, May 18, 1816.
“Economy is more the order…”: Hinde, Castlereagh, p. 235.
“Endless debates upon…”: Reid, Durham, p. 92.
“one of the most…”: ibid.
“With Napoléon safely locked away…”: Hinde, p. 237.
“drain the people of England…” Hunt, Memoirs, III, p. 321.
3. COLD FRONTS
“large quantities of snow”: Charleston City Gazette, June 5, 1816.
“the unusual long spell…”: New York Evening Post, April 25, 1816.
“the ground was covered…”: Franklin Herald, June 4, 1816.
“heavy black frost”: Harrington, Year Without, p. 125.
“ploughing up and…”: National Register, May 18, 1816.
“The season continues…”: New England Palladium, June 4, 1816.
“The last spring and…”: New England Palladium, June 14, 1816.
“the season has been…”: Thomas, Travels, p. 1.
“the morning was rainy…”: ibid., p. 10.
“so damp and chill…”: ibid., p. 16.
“was so cold that we shivered…”: ibid.
“wrapt in the drapery…”: ibid., p. 29.
“This morning was very…”: ibid., p. 32.
“a severe frost”: ibid., p. 35.
“the clouds rolled on…”: ibid., p. 39.
“When the last of May…”: Schlegel, p. 1.
“The whole of the month…”: Hoyt, “Cold Summer,” p. 119.
“Everybody complains…”: Chambersburg Democratic Republican, June 3, 1816.
“a crowned Jacobin…”: Lucas-Dubreton, Restoration, p. 35.
“There are continual reports…”: Frye, After Waterloo, p. 151.
“The uneasiness of the court…”: National Register, July 13, 1816.
“There was a strange feeling…”: National Register, July 13, 1816.
“The manners of the French…”: Jones, Letters of Mary Shelley, p. 9.
“discontent and sullenness”: Jones, Letters of Percy Shelley, p. 347.
“The spring, as the inhabitants…”: ibid., p. 18.
“Never was scene more…”: ibid.
“Unfortunately, an almost perpetual…”: ibid., p. 19.
“hot and sultry…”: Albany Daily Advertiser, June 19, 1816.
“the warmest day that…”: Vermont Mirror, June 12, 1816.
“The mild influence of…”: National Aegis, June 12, 1816.
“The night was so warm…”: Newburyport Herald, June 14, 1816.
“the most distant apparently…”: Quebec Gazette, June 13, 1816.
“and were to be met with…”: Quebec Gazette, June 13, 1816.
“the roofs of the houses…”: Quebec Gazette, June 13, 1816.
“the whole of the surrounding country…”: Quebec Gazette, June 13, 1816.
“driving before it an immense…”: Quebec Gazette, June 13, 1816.
“the frost was sharp…”: Albany Daily Advertiser, June 19, 1816.
“Early this morning…”: Montreal Herald, June 8, 1816.
“Probably no one living…”: Danville North Star, June 15, 1816.
“a novel spectacle…”: Rutland Herald, June 12, 1816.
“you could pick up…”: Mussey, “Yankee Chills,” p. 436.
“it had rained much…”: Ludlum, Early American Winters, p. 190.
“in beautiful large flakes…”: Newburyport Herald, June 14, 1816.
“a violent and heavy storm…”: Connecticut Courant, June 25, 1816.
“The wind blew a gale…”: Emery, Reminiscences, p. 289.
“our teeth fairly chattered…”: ibid., p. 289.
“we shivered round…”: ibid.
“as severe from half an hour…”: Albany Argus, June 11, 1816.
“a considerable quantity of snow…”: Ludlum, Early American Winters, p. 191.
“on the mountain to the west…”: North American Review, May 1817, p. 154.
“The situation here…”: Albany Daily Advertiser, June 7, 1816.
“The surface of the ground…”: Ludlum, Early American Winters, p. 190.
“I well remember the…”: Stommel, “The Year,” p. 176.
“In the evening, the atmosphere…”: Connecticut Courant, June 25, 1816.
“Moist earth was frozen…”: North American Review, May 1817, p. 154.
“This morning, the 7th of June…”: Columbian, June 7, 1816.
“The awful scene continued…”: Ludlum, Early American, p. 190.
“Still uncomfortably cold…”: Danville North Star, June 15, 1816.
“6th, snowed in considerable…”: Ludlum, Early American, p. 192.
“large icicles pending…”: Salem Gazette, June 11, 1816.
“snow fell in this town…”: Columbian Centinel, June 12, 1816.
“I can find no person…”: Albany Daily Advertiser, July 3, 1816.
“The weather was more severe…”: Danville North Star, June 15, 1816.
“but still frost and ice…”: Connecticut Courant, June 25, 1816.<
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“most severe frost…”: Connecticut Courant, June 25, 1816.
“It has frozen very hard…”: Ludlum, Early American, p. 190.
“severely cold and…”: Vermont Mirror, June 12, 1816.
“the very face of…”: Vermont Mirror, June 12, 1816.
“killed to the ground…”: Stommel, Volcano, p. 37.
“Another frost, cold…”: Ludlum, Early American, p. 190.
“Indian corn, beans…”: North American Review, May 1817, p. 154.
“For three days we had…”: Thomas, p. 53.
“but the fruit has been…”: ibid., p. 82.
“We saw neither peaches…”: ibid., p. 105.
“The trees on the sides of the hills…”: North American Review, May 1817, p. 154.
“the crops of wheat…”: National Aegis, June 12, 1816.
“great damage has been done…”: Albany Daily Advertiser, June 11, 1816.
“totally destroyed…”: Niles’ Weekly Register, August 10, 1816, p. 385.
“a check is given…”: Eastern Argus, June 12, 1816.
“In some instances the corn is…”: American Advocate, June 15, 1816.
“What is to become…”: Connecticut Courant, June 25, 1816.
“the most gloomy apprehensions…”: Brattleboro Reporter, July 17, 1816.
“the weather, during the last week…”: Albany Argus, June 11, 1816.
“the oldest inhabitants…”: Rutland Herald, June 12, 1816.
“never before…”: Vermont Mirror, June 12, 1816.
“we are very apt to misrecollect…”: Albany Daily Advertiser, June 19, 1816.
“I began these experiments…”: Fleming, Meteorology, p. 6.
“the chief object ought to be…”: Wood, p. 726.
“so that we may know…” Quoted in Abbe, “History,” p. 546.
4. THE HANDWRITING OF GOD
“This is an extraordinary spring…”: Columbian, June 7, 1816.
“We do not recollect to have witnessed…”: American Beacon, May 9, 1816.