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archive messages from local folders, messages are gone

  • 1 reply
  • 3 have this problem
  • 10 views
  • Last reply by christ1

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TB just ate a bunch of my files after I attempted to archive them. They appear to have vaporized. Here's what I did:

1. My Archive options are set to 'Yearly archived folders', and 'Keep existing folder structure of archived messages' is checked (enabled). 2. The files were located in a folder under 'Local Folders', having originated from 1 or more different accounts. 3. I selected all the individual messages in the folder to archive, and hit 'A'. 4. TB appeared to be moving them - status bar counted down the files as they were being moved, and they disappeared from their source folder. 5. In the Folders pane, a folder appears with the name of the source folder, under the appropriate year - and it indicates a message count and folder size that matches the files that were just moved. 6. In the Messages pane - nada. Nothing. Zip. Zilch. Empty. 7. Back in the original source folder, ditto.

So the messages appear to be there - somewhere - but no apparent way to access them.

Any assistance appreciated!

TB just ate a bunch of my files after I attempted to archive them. They appear to have vaporized. Here's what I did: 1. My Archive options are set to 'Yearly archived folders', and 'Keep existing folder structure of archived messages' is checked (enabled). 2. The files were located in a folder under 'Local Folders', having originated from 1 or more different accounts. 3. I selected all the individual messages in the folder to archive, and hit 'A'. 4. TB appeared to be moving them - status bar counted down the files as they were being moved, and they disappeared from their source folder. 5. In the Folders pane, a folder appears with the name of the source folder, under the appropriate year - and it indicates a message count and folder size that matches the files that were just moved. 6. In the Messages pane - nada. Nothing. Zip. Zilch. Empty. 7. Back in the original source folder, ditto. So the messages appear to be there - somewhere - but no apparent way to access them. Any assistance appreciated!

All Replies (1)

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Use Windows Explorer and navigate to your profile folder. https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/profiles-where-thunderbird-stores-user-data#w_how-to-find-your-profile

Locate the mail file corresponding to the archived folder.

What is the size of the file?

Mail files are plain text files. Open the file with a text editor and check whether there are any messages in it.