Sent Emails

Is there a way to search sent emails similar to the way you can in received ones? It doesn't work for me.

Are you referring to the Mail app that comes with OS X?
Yes, you can go into the Search box and in the upper right search bar just type whatever word you're looking for. Be sure you're not giving up before it has a chance to produce the search results. If it's a common word or phrase in your emails it can take a few seconds to produce results and that could be misinterpreted as no results. So give it some time.

Well, duh, I never designated at the top of the column "sent" mail. I thought as long as it was designated from the left hand column it would work.

Thanks.