The eruption of Tambora in case you could not surmise this from Tracy's description was huge. It was much bigger and much deadlier than the far more well known eruption of Krakatoa that happened almost 70 years later. People reported hearing it as far away as Sumatra, which is more than a thousand miles away from where it was happening. There was also so much ash in the air that it was according to reports dark for three days or 300 miles around the volcano after the eruption peaked.