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Lost access to old emails in Thunderbird

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  • Last reply by david

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I use Thunderbird 115.6.1 on Windows 10 with multiple email accounts. One account closed several years ago, so I disabled syncing with the server but I kept my messages local so I could continue to read them (and reply from other accounts). This is an IMAP account but I was basically using it in offline mode. A few weeks ago, Thunderbird started trying to reconnect to the account automatically. I had turned off "check for new messages at startup", "check for new messages every X minutes" and "allow immediate server notifications" so I don't know why it keeps trying to connect to the server. Now I can't read the emails in that account. The headers are visible in my inbox but when I try to open a message, it's blank; it tries to connect to the server. I contacted the server host (a university) and they say they no longer have a copy of my emails. Is there any way to retrieve my messages from my local profile? ThanksS!

I use Thunderbird 115.6.1 on Windows 10 with multiple email accounts. One account closed several years ago, so I disabled syncing with the server but I kept my messages local so I could continue to read them (and reply from other accounts). This is an IMAP account but I was basically using it in offline mode. A few weeks ago, Thunderbird started trying to reconnect to the account automatically. I had turned off "check for new messages at startup", "check for new messages every X minutes" and "allow immediate server notifications" so I don't know why it keeps trying to connect to the server. Now I can't read the emails in that account. The headers are visible in my inbox but when I try to open a message, it's blank; it tries to connect to the server. I contacted the server host (a university) and they say they no longer have a copy of my emails. Is there any way to retrieve my messages from my local profile? ThanksS!

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Being an IMAP account may have killed it. Had the messages been copied to local folders, they may have survived. My guess is they're gone, as Thunderbird does not back up deletes.