RUMNEY — The search for a missing North Carolina man who disappeared on July 25 near Stinson Lake has been scaled back, but Jim Kneeland was still heading back there Saturday afternoon.

Kneeland, a lieutenant with the state Fish and Game Department, said it’s “very unlikely” that 72-year-old Hugh Armstrong is still alive if he was lost in the woods. But he feels drawn to keep looking for the man, to return him to his family.

Armstrong was visiting Rumney with 11 family members for a week’s vacation last month. Dressed in sneakers, shorts, a T-shirt and a white baseball cap and wearing his glasses, he went out for a walk around the lake around 6 a.m. on July 25.

That’s the last time his family saw him.

In the 12 days since, local volunteers have joined agents from Fish and Game and other agencies in scouring the woods but have turned up no trace of the father and grandfather.

Kneeland said the man’s family left Rumney to return home last week. “I’m sure it was quite an emotional ride back to North Carolina without their family member,” he said.

“I can’t imagine getting in the car, packing the luggage and going. You’ve got to move on, I guess, but how do you?” he asked. “I’m sure there are days when you just think about Rumney, and where is he?”

Folks who live here haven’t forgotten Armstrong, Kneeland said, “and nor have we.”

Fish and Game moved some dive training that had been scheduled for Newfound Lake on Wednesday to Stinson Lake. And they held some scheduled dog training in the area on Friday, to see if the dogs could turn up anything.

Other dog teams from New England K-9 Search and Rescue, Fish and Game and state police have searched a wide area, including snowmobile and hiking trails. New Hampshire Army National Guard offered its helicopters.

And Kneeland said, “There are good, dedicated folks in Rumney who are traipsing around in the woods.”

It’s difficult to have no resolution to all the searching, he said. “I like to think we usually come up with them, and we usually do. It’s just a matter of time.”

He said it’s likely a hiker or hunter may come upon Armstrong’s body in the weeks or months to come.

For now, Hugh Armstrong’s disappearance remains a mystery, Kneeland said. His family believes he must have been stricken with some kind of medical condition that kept him from calling out as searchers scoured the woods those first long nights.

There’s nothing to lead investigators to think the man chose to vanish, said Kneeland, who spent a lot of time with Armstrong’s family during the week after he disappeared.

“They just seem like a close family up spending vacation,” he said. “The grandkids are here. It just doesn’t seem like the time a dedicated grandparent would choose to take off on his family.”

Armstrong is described as 5-feet-4, weighing 175 pounds, with brown-gray hair and gray eyes.

If anyone remembers anything from the morning of July 25 that might help, Kneeland said, “We’d like to hear from them.” He asked people to call state police at 846-3333.

swickham@unionleader.com