It may be a good idea to start moving emails you want to keep (such as the photo) into folders that you create. I doubt any email program would automatically clear user-specific folders.
Have you looked in the trash and junk folders (pretty standard on most email programs) to see if your emails are there?
A computer techie may be able to recover the emails if you cannot find them anywhere by means of your programs. They could still be on your hard disc somewhere.