Volcano (formerly Soldier’s Gulch and The Volcano) in Amador County, California is a census-designated site. It lies at a height of 631 m (2070 feet). At the 2010 census, the population was 115. It is located just north of Pine Grove at 38 ° 26′35′′N 120 ° 37′51′′W. The town is recorded as a historic landmark in California. The community is in 95689 ZIP code and 209 area code.
The town is named in a bowl-shaped valley that was believed to have been caused by a volcano by early miners. That conviction was only strengthened by the early morning fog rising from the valley ground. The region was first known to be designated by males from Colonel Stevenson, who in 1849 mined Gulch Soldiers. A post office was set up in 1851 and there were 300 houses by April 1852. By 1853 the apartments and gulches were swarming with males, with 11 shops, six restaurants, three bakeries and three lounges. Started in 1855, hydraulic mining activities brought thousands of fortune seekers to form a town of 17 hotels, a library, a theater, and rapid justice courts.
The gold of Volcano served the Union during the Civil War. The Blues Volcano smuggled the “Old Abe” 800 lb cannon into the city by hearse, intimidating the sympathizers of the rebel. The cannon was cast in 1837 by Cyrus Alger & Co. in Boston and is the first of two 6-pounders to be stamped with serial number 4 on the same day. At Shiloh Battlefield, the other cannon still survives and is called “Shiloh Sam.” During the Civil War, “Old Abe” was only fired once.
Many of the Main Street companies were owned by the Confederate faction known as Golden Circle Knights. “Old Abe” was fired down Main Street, causing windows to break in all the shops that were not warned–those sympathetic to the South.[8] Abe is the only cannon of that age in the U.S. still on a wooden carriage of the nineteenth century.
