The fiercest, bloodiest wars are those fought not over territory or a throne, but over a way of life.

The story of her long life begins before that war, and there is a touch of mystery and interesting tradition in the very beginning.

The Shenandoah and Alabama were anchored just south of Harthaven one recent muggy, overcast morning and it struck me how innocent these famously-named schooners looked.

The other day I was looking at a photo taken from Pam Clark’s old house of Shenandoah, at anchor in back of the Black Dog, and waxing nostalgic. Then today I read about Shenandoah’s namesake, and the original Alabama. I had thought they had been Confederate blockade runners, sort of romantic vessels.

By MARK ALAN LOVEWELL

The Civil War came perilously close to the Vineyard in 1863 and 1864, when Confederate raiders sank fishing boats and schooners all around the Island.

James B. (Jim) Richardson 3rd of Oak Bluffs, a respected historian, told tales about the raiders in a talk at the Martha’s Vineyard Museum titled The Civil War Comes to New England: Confederate Raiders by Land and Sea.

For the Jim Thomas Spirituals Choir, the history is as much a part of the experience as the music. Tracing the evolution of American music through the Underground Railroad and the Middle Passage, Jim Thomas and his chorus sing a story of our cultural past.

The horror of the Civil War was the graphic and powerful subject of the 1989 Academy Award-winning film Glory, screened at the Katharine Cornell Theatre on Monday night. The event kicked off the Civil War Film Series, jointly sponsored by the Martha’s Vineyard Film Society and the Martha’s Vineyard Museum to commemorate the country’s most deadly war through movies, talks and exhibitions. The museum recently launched an exhibit titled We Are Marching Along: Martha’s Vineyard and the Civil War which continues until April 2012.

Pulitzer prize-winning historian William McFeely set the mood for the rapt crowd at the library of the Martha’s Vineyard Museum on Tuesday. They had gathered to learn about the role that one Vineyard ship played at the close of the Civil War.

When the Civil War began> a century and a half ago the Vineyard was decidedly pro-Union, but ever since there has remained one prominent Vineyarder whose allegiance to The Cause has been suspect. He greets many thousands of visitors yearly from his Ocean Park pedestal and his original foot will be on display next Saturday when the Martha’s Vineyard Museum unveils its exhibit We Are Marching Along: Martha’s Vineyard and the Civil War.

SEEN THE GLORY: A Novel of the Battle of Gettysburg. By John Hough, Jr. Simon & Schuster, June, 2009. 420 pages. $25.