RexRox

Q: Apple Mail deleted all my mail!

On one of our computers Mail was being a bit flaky & not showing the trash.

To try & get the trash to show I deleted a few messages in the outbox & it didn't show. The main user of that computer then said 'oh just delete all the sent messages' (there were over 6k of them...)

So I selected all & hit delete. Nothing. Repeated. Nothing. Gave it a few minutes. Nothing.

Shut Mail down & reopened & went to the Inbox to see if the option was there to show trash &... every single message in the Inbox was gone. Checked Sent & all the messages were still there!!! I then highlighted all in Sent & deleted & they went but...

The Trash box was now showing up but only about 10 of the deleted messages were in it.

There should have been 6k of the sent messages & about 500 from the Inbox.

The accounts are all POP so the mail should have been locally stored.

Where has it all gone?!?!?!?!

iMac, OS X Mavericks (10.9.5), 27-inch, Late 2009, 2.8GHz i7

Posted on May 18, 2015 3:41 AM

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Q: Apple Mail deleted all my mail!

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  • Helpful answers

  • by Linc Davis,Apple recommended

    Linc Davis Linc Davis May 18, 2015 6:55 AM in response to RexRox
    Level 10 (207,926 points)
    Applications
    May 18, 2015 6:55 AM in response to RexRox

    Quit Mail. Force quit if necessary.

    Back up all data before proceeding.

    Triple-click anywhere in the line below on this page to select it:

    ~/Library/Mail/V2/MailData

    Copy the selected text to the Clipboard by pressing the key combination command-C. In the Finder, select

              Go Go to Folder

    from the menu bar. Paste into the box that opens by pressing command-V, then press return.

    A folder window will open. Inside it there should be files with names as follows:

              Envelope Index

              ExternalUpdates.storedata

    Move those files to the Desktop, leaving the window open. Other files in the folder may have longer names that begin as above. Move those files, if any, to the Trash.

    Relaunch Mail. It should prompt you to re-import your messages. You may get a warning that the index is damaged and that Mail has to quit. Click OK. Typically, the process takes a few minutes, but it may take hours if you have gigantic mailboxes. In that case, you may be able to speed things up by temporarily adding your home folder to the Privacy list in the Spotlight preference pane. Remove it when Mail has finished importing.

    Test. If Mail now works as expected, you can delete the files you moved to the Desktop. Otherwise, post your results.

  • by FrancesBad,

    FrancesBad FrancesBad Jul 13, 2016 11:09 AM in response to Linc Davis
    Level 1 (4 points)
    Jul 13, 2016 11:09 AM in response to Linc Davis

    My inbox just suddenly started deleting emails a few days ago. I tried this, but the email still didn't repopulate my inbox. I know it's in there, because the number of emails in the Library folder was correct, but I came back to the same few in my inbox. I held onto that library folder, because I don't want to lose those emails. Is there anyone who can help?

  • by Eric Root,

    Eric Root Eric Root Jul 14, 2016 10:55 AM in response to FrancesBad
    Level 9 (69,881 points)
    iTunes
    Jul 14, 2016 10:55 AM in response to FrancesBad

    You might want to start your own post since this one is from last year. A new post would be much more visible. You can link to this one.

     

    Try rebuilding the mailbox.

     

    Rebuild mailbox