ELLSWORTH – Despite having early leads in election returns Tuesday night, the challengers in two races for Hancock County commission fell short of dislodging the incumbents.

Voting results released early Wednesday morning indicate Commissioners Kenneth Shea and Fay Lawson won their races comfortably and will continue to serve on the three-seat panel.

In another Hancock County race, the Republican Party will retain its hold on the Register of Probate position. Bonnie Cousins of Ellsworth, who defeated incumbent Margaret Lunt of Dedham in the Republican primary in June, defeated Par Kettis of Castine by more than 5,000 votes.

Shea defeated challenger Robert Bauer of Blue Hill by 962 votes, finishing with 55 percent of the votes and winning 12 of the 15 municipalities in the commission district. Shea, a Republican from Ellsworth, received 5,449 votes while Bauer, a Democrat, received 4,487.

In Ellsworth, Shea won each of the city’s four wards and outpaced Bauer by nearly 900 votes, which comprises most of the difference by which he defeated his opponent.

Bauer carried his hometown, winning Blue Hill by a 1,016-555 vote margin, and in neighboring Surry, where he received 512 votes to Shea’s 421. He also defeated Shea in Sorrento, where he got 107 votes and Shea got 99.

Democratic incumbent Fay Lawson of Tremont defeated her Republican rival, Bruce Carter of Franklin, by a 3-to-2 margin, winning 6,367 votes to his 4,418.

Lawson, who was appointed to the commission in December 2002 to fill the unfinished term of Dennis Damon, received strong support on Mount Desert Island. She received 4,463 total votes from Bar Harbor, Mount Desert, Southwest Harbor and Tremont. Carter received 2,145 total votes from the same four island towns.

Carter beat Lawson in his hometown, Hancock, Lamoine and Trenton by a 400-vote total margin.

In the countywide race for Register of Probate, Cousins beat Kettis by 5,502 votes. Cousins received 18,250 votes and Kettis, a Democrat, received 12,748 votes.

Kettis fared best on the west side of the county, where he carried Brooklin, Brooksville, Castine, Deer Isle, Penobscot, Sedgwick and Stonington. Kettis also won in Bar Harbor and Cranberry Isles but Cousins carried the remainder of the county’s 37 municipalities.