Yes, there's a switchback where if you go straight you end up on the old phone line trail which heads towards west peak then abruptly turns south.
If they went that way, they should have found a rough, difficult-to-follow trail, and without a map could just be roaming around on the herd paths trying to figure a way out.
This old route is still visible on the historic USGS Plymouth quad at docs.unh.edu. Here's what I once figured out:
It goes down towards Tripoli Mill. Head over to the 1928 Plymouth USGS quadrangle.
Scroll all the way to the top right. Right above where it says "Breadtray Ridge" you see a trail come on to the map then loop back north off the top, then just west it comes back down again. By coordinating with the Franconia Quadrangle, I determined that's the route.
As you can see, it comes down the ridge then right at the bottom, a tiny spur goes back north onto the other map to a building marker (old cabin?). A little further south, it splits again ... one leg goes west to meet up with what is now the East Pond Trail just north of Tripoli Mill, the other leg follows an unnamed brook to Tripoli Road and though not shown on the old topo, that comes out right by the northern end of the Mt. Tecumseh Trail.