Restore old iMessage chat contents after OS X reinstall?

Last night I had to do a wipe of my MacBook Pro running Mountain Lion. At the end of the installer I chose to migrate all my old apps/data/settings back onto the machine from a recent Time Machine backup. Everything transferred over correctly with the exception of all my iMessage threads. When you open the Messages app, all the recently chatted with friends show up on the left hand sidebar, but when you click on one, the thread contents are blank. Is there any way to manually reimport all of the old iMessage chat contents into my currently installation?
I still have all of my old iMessage data on my Time Machine backup under the folder "~/Library/Messages" folder. I tried copying over the new version of this folder with the old version stored on the Time Machine backup, but the reimport didn't seem to take so I reverted back.
Anyone have any ideas? Thanks

HI,
I would have said that the ~/Library/Messages folder was the thing to copy back.
As you "owned" the original I would have thought there would be no Ownership issues.
You would need the Archive folder (All Old Chats if you were saving them) and the Chat.db items as these hold the iMessages chats and the attachments if there are any.
Two possible issues
Creating an iCloud ID with an older Apple ID and using a different name in Messages to register for iMessages
Although iCloud web site will let you login with either the originating Apple ID or the created @me.com name iMessages registers only one of these rather than the "whole Account". (Obviously one can become an alias in Messages for the iMessages account)
The second is related as it is which ID is then used to Login in System Preferences > iCloud.
This then passes over to Mail, Contacts and Calendars and can be active for Messages.
9:26 PM Saturday; October 13, 2012
Please, if posting Logs, do not post any Log info after the line "Binary Images for iChat"
 iMac 2.5Ghz 5i 2011 (Mountain Lion 10.8.2)
 G4/1GhzDual MDD (Leopard 10.5.8)
 MacBookPro 2Gb (Snow Leopard 10.6.8)
 Mac OS X (10.6.8),
 Couple of iPhones and an iPad
"Limit the Logs to the Bits above Binary Images."  No, Seriously

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copied from iCloud: Backup and restore overview
Check also iPhone: Transferring information from your current iPhone to a new iPhone

Restore old iMessage chat contents after OS X reinstall?

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