Born in the Cretan village of Asi Gonia in 1882, as a young man Gyparis took part in paramilitary activities against Turkish, Bulgarian and Romanian interests during the Macedonian Struggle, with great success. Later, during the Balkan Wars, he organized the liberation of the island of Samos (then still under Ottoman rule). In 1915, he organized a volunteer corps of Cretans that fought for France in Alsace. After Greece's entry into World War I he fought in the Macedonian front in 1917-18.