is this what you were talking about?
The Year Without a Summer
The eruption of Indonesia's Mount Tambora on 5 April 1815 was one of the largest eruptions in history. Tambora spewed sulphur-rich gases that rose to a height of 28 miles and created a giant sun filter in the northern hemisphere that caused the spring and summer of 1816 to be extremely cold across Europe and North America. Snowfalls and frost occurred in June, July and August and all but the hardiest grains were destroyed. Destruction of the corn crop caused farmers to slaughter their livestock. Soup kitchens were opened to feed the hungry. Sea ice formed in the Atlantic shipping lanes and glaciers advanced down mountain slopes to exceptionally low levels. Hundreds of thousands died of starvation as crops failed, touching off a wave of migration to the American South and Midwest. Farmers repeatedly tried to get a crop in the ground, but each time a killer frost withered the tender roots. Corn and grain prices shot up to $5 and $10 per bushel and oats that had been 12 cents a bushel rose to 92 cents. Riots erupted in Britain and France as starving citizens broke into grain warehouses and left them empty. Violence was even worse in Switzerland where the government declared a national emergency and grain purchases from Russia were intercepted at the border and confiscated by hungry citizens.
In Indonesia itself, 83,000 died as a direct result of the eruption, most from the hot gases and many from being bombed by hot lava being ejected for miles around Mount Tambora. It has been estimated that 93 cubic miles of ash were ejected, and it took five years before the green shoots of vegetation began to poke through the land covered with volcanic ash to a distance of 250 miles from Tambora.