Problems with proxy in Thunderbird portable

Ok, we have an automatic proxy url here, and I got firefox portable to work putting that in.. and to get gaim portable to work, I took the output from the automatic proxy url to get some manual proxy info, and that worked.. but when I put in either the manual proxy or automatic proxy in Thunderbird.. it does not work..
It fails to connect.. I am connecting to my own imap server, so I troubleshooted a little.. I can use putty with the same proxy info to telnet a port and monitor on the firewall on the other end, and see the connection attempt being made.. but when I try thunderbird.. the connection attempt is never reaching the server with the same proxy settings.. I ever tried using the IP address of the server to get around name resolutions possibilities.. Oh.. another thing I tried.. I even forwarded the port on the firewall to another obsure port number just in case port 993 was blocked or something.. but that did not help.. Ideas?!?! I am just out of ideas..