Two large Neo-Romanesque churches stand near the mound and penitentiary, undoubtedly reminding prisoners who looked out their barred windows of the paths they should have followed. St. Francis Xavier Roman Catholic Church (1916–1917), northeast corner of Jefferson Avenue and 7th Street, is a handsome Tuscan Romanesque basilica, built of tan brick with limestone and terra-cotta trim and covered with a red tile roof. Its prominent corner campanile rises to an arcaded open belfry topped with a broad pyramidal roof supporting a cross. Surprisingly, the architects listed in Manufacturers Record, Meanor and Sweeney, were from Huntington, not Wheeling.

Simpson United Methodist Church (1907), north side of 7th Street between Morton and Jefferson avenues, is a massive Richardsonian Romanesque structure of brown sandstone with a battlemented octagonal tower and an arched colonnade sheltering the entrance. Although the church is reminiscent of numerous West Virginia Methodist churches designed by J. Charles Fulton of Uniontown, Pennsylvania, local architect and builder William Batson is credited.