I bought a couple of 18650 batteries that I mean to solder into a data logger that has a solar panel and a charge controller. Reading up on the subject, I found advice to discharge the batteries down to 3v before soldering, and to choose a discharging load that keeps the current under 1A, for safety reasons. I made a circuit of one battery, 10 ohm (10W) load and ammeter and was surprised that the ammeter read only 30mA. I chose the load based on I = V/R = 3.9 / 10 = 0.390A. Why don't I see that on the ammeter?

What was the voltage drop over the resistor and what else was in the circuit?