did you try and hang your folders as sub folders of the inbox or as sub folders of the gmail account. I do not think gmail actually supports putting mail in sub folders of the inbox.

It was working with subfolders off the inbox for months, maybe because thunderbird was filtering. Current problem is a result of a new setup after a system reset.

I just want to get the emails from those subfolders back onto my computer. They exist as labelled categories on gmail, I just want to get them back into my thunderbird inbox with or without the subfolders.

Check this: right click on imap gmail account and select 'Settings' Select 'Server settings' click on 'Advanced' button 'Advanced Account Settings' window opens.

• Imap Server directory: [Gmail]
• select 'Show only subscribed folders'
• select 'Server supports folders that contain subfolders and messages'

see image below. If not selected then select: 'Server supports folders that contain subfolders and messages' and see if this gets the folder to reappear or be available in Subscribe list.

If you already have all the above settings selected ... try unchecking: 'Show only subscribed folders' Click on all the Ok's

Then see if: right click on imap gmail account and select 'Subscribe' opens the subscribe list showing the one you want to sunsctribe to see.

Yeah, I had already tried the subscribe stuff (OP).

What I did was go to web gmail, where gmail had picked up the folder info from thunderbird and created labels. I selected all the labelled messages (by searching on each label & selecting all), then clicked on move to inbox. Now all the messages are in the inbox and can come over to thunderbird and I can filter them into my subfolders which I recreated.

So solved for the moment.