Are you and your wife using totally distinct and separate accounts? I see a similar issue in that a search will label some messages with an identity other than the one that was actually used. In my case it's the display name used in a specific context. I think this a "lazy" look-up into your address book and it returns with the first item it finds. You might be able to stop this by turning off all the "prefer display name" checkboxes. :-( And I think there is a particular problem with all the messages that can be reported as being to or from "me".

Now, searching in Thunderbird. There are three tools for searching for messages:

Global Search ctrl+k QuickFilter Bar ctrl+shift+k Folder Search ctrl+shift+f

Try those shortcuts and tell us which is which by your description. As far as I know, no search tools have actually been removed.

I can't make out from your description which one you think you have lost.

Hi Zenos

Thanks for getting back to me so promptly, it is much appreciated.

My wife and I do have totally separate Email addresses although they are with the same ISP but my wife does not use my computer for her Emails, she has her own. I only have her account set up on my computer in case I need to access Emails on her behalf and there are none at all for her actually stored on my computer. I attach a screenshot showing the results of a search with my wife's name, Jan Turner, where mine actually is on the messages in the folders for both sent and received Emails. I also have four other Email accounts set up on the computer which never feature on any messages in searches. Would just deleting her account from my computer temporarily, possibly resolve the issue?

The only "prefer display name" checkbox I can find is on the Edit > Preferences > Display > Advanced tab called "Show only display name for people in my address book", is this the one I need to uncheck?

The search that I am referring to is the one in the box to the left of the three bar "Display the Thunderbird Menu" symbol which appears to search all folders. The box in this position used to search the current window and there used to be a box above it which searched all folders and both had their uses. Maybe you don't refer to these boxes as searches but that is how I have always used them as I wasn't aware of any keyboard shortcuts (which I am not good at remembering!).

I look forward to hearing from you.

Kind regards

Keith Turner

That's global search. It is likely just to find the word turner as a partial match. You may get better results by forcing a literal search with quotes e.g. "roger turner" and that should exclude the items that mention jan turner. A check here shows that if I search for my wife's full name, typed as two words, it gets any message that involves our surname. (It's basically searching for forename OR surname.) Placing quotes around it restricts it to exactly her name.

But I think the search tool you're looking for is ctrl+shift+f.

Try the shortcuts just to make them appear. Then you know which items you want to restore to the toolbar and we can tackle that as a separate exercise.

If you can see them, they show the shortcut inside the search text box. But of course if they don't display, you can't see that prompt so you're in the dark. Chicken/egg. ;-)

Hi Zenos

Thanks again for getting back to me.

You are right the ctrl+shift+f option (or Edit > Find > Search Messages in my case) is exactly what I need and the results are as they should be but I am still not sure why the global search attributes all my Emails to my wife's Email address. However, problem solved so thanks very much.

Cheers